The Merging of Realities
by Sherlockian-Vortex
Summary: Lucy Peverall is proud to say she is a fangirl and a superwholockain at that. She's dreamed of going on adventures like her favorite characters have done. However, coming from a small town... she doesn't get much of a chance to do that. Until one day, when the fictional characters she's always admired enter exit their stories and enter her's. (Includes DW, Sherlock, and SPN)
1. Chapter 1: Hunters at my Door

_I live in Doubery, a town where nothing interesting happens. I've lived here for nearly all my life, and now I'm going to college only a few miles away. It seems like I can never escape the safety this town offers, so I watched t.v. shows and read books to flee from my dull reality. I absorbed the lives of extraordinary people who solved crimes, battled against demons, and traveled through time. My one and only dream was to go on an adventure like they all had. I learned everything I could ranging from martial arts to operating a telescope, so I could learn the night sky. I went for years never finding an adventure to partake in, and I began to wonder if I ever would. Perhaps the world wasn't meant for adventures. When I first read about the murder of Ally Johnson, a girl who went to the local high school, I thought it was a tragedy and threw the newspaper into the recycling bin. However, I quickly realized that this girl's murder was far more interesting, as strange happenings began to occur in the town. After all this time, I finally was going to have my adventure._

I was re-reading one of my many books on mythological creatures when a knock on the door broke the silence of my house. I glanced up from my book surprised, and closed it quickly. The fact that someone actually came to my door was unusual enough, so I swiftly got out of my chair. I looked through one of the upper level windows to see two men standing outside. One was shifting fromfoot to foot, and the other was whispering something in his ear. The two of them struck me as familiar and trustworthy. I barely contained a squeal when I realized who they were.

I ran down the stairs quickly, pausing in front of the door, suddenly uncertain if these two men were who I thought they might be. I eyed the vase standing next to the door. Most people put glass beads in their vases to make their flowers look nicer. Me? I put salt into the container. (One can never be too cautious.) I took hold of the vase, sprinkling some of the salt near the entrance of the door, far enough away that it could be opened and closed without disturbing the line. A spray bottle filled with holy water was sitting next to the vase, ready for action as usual. I held my breath and turned the brass knob. The two men instantly ceased their conversation, focusing on me instead.

"Hi. I'm agent Alfred Berkley, and this my partner, Agent Fred Stevenson. We're investigating the murder of Ally Johnson. We heard that you knew her, and we would like to ask you a few questions." The man and his partner both flashed their badges in my face before tucking them away quickly. The man, who had introduced his partner and himself was the one I had seen fidgeting beforehand. I hadn't been able to see much of his face from the window, and I nearly swooned at the sight of his jaw line only a foot away from my eyes. His partner was taller and younger, closer to my age, equally as attractive. However, my first thought was that he looked overdue for a haircut.

"Yes, of course. You're US Marshalls, did you say?" I leaned casually against the door frame watching the two of them. They couldn't possibly be who I thought they were, but strange things had been happening all week… maybe it really was them.

"Uh , yes ma'am"

"Funny though… your badges say FBI."

The tall one's eyes widened slightly, and he looked down at his partner as if asking what to do. I could barely hold in a smirk.

"Sam. Dean. No more lying, okay?" I opened the door wider to let them in.

"You must be mistaking us for someone else. I'm Agent Berkley and this is Agent Stevenson," Dean said smoothly, keeping in character. Sam followed along, but I could see the gears in his head turning, trying to figure out how I knew. He may be smart in his own right, but I had the upper head here.

"I know you're not US Marshalls or FBI agents. You're Sam and Dean Winchester, and you're both hunters." I stared at them evenly, waiting for a response.

"How the hell do you know who we are?!" Dean demanded. He pulled out a gun and pointed it at me. I would be lying through the skin of my teeth if I said I wasn't scared. Heck, if I had been wearing boots, I would have been shaking in them. I mean, I was Dean Winchester plus a gun. I doubt there was a single soul who _wouldn't_ be afraid. I locked eyes with Sam, the more level headed one of the duo, and quickly looked toward his brother, and then back to the tall hunter.

"Dean," he said slowly," I don't think you should shoot her."

"Why the hell not?" His gun was still pointed at me. I reached behind the door for the vase, taking a handful of salt just in case.

"Because there's salt around her door," Sam replied. Dean looked down.

"It's a common superstition, Sam."

"I don't think she's a common person, Dean."

"Look, I'd love to help, actually I plan to help, but if somehow I'm not helpful I know someone who is." I interjected. Dean lowered his gun slightly.

"Plus," I said smirking (no use trying to contain it anymore), "I've got pie."

Dean lowered the gun instantly. "Pie? What kind?" Typical Dean, he was more interested in the identity of the pie than the identity of the person standing in front of him.

"Blueberry. Plus some information that you'll want to know, so please come inside."

"Thanks," Sam said with a genuine smile. "We didn't catch your name before."

"Lucy."

"Like the cartoon character from Peanuts?"

"Exactly like the cartoon character from Peanuts."

Sam walked through the doorway and over the salt line. I hadn't been too concerned about him being a demon, but it was nice to have that verified. Dean was following right behind, but I held my hand out to stop him.

"Wait a moment Dean."

"What?"

"How do I know you're you?"

"What? What are you talking about? Of course I'm me."

"I just need to check okay?"

"You didn't need to check Sam!"

"No I didn't. Sam complimented me, though. He said I was an uncommon person."

"Then what do I have to-" Dean sputtered mid-sentence as I threw the handful of salt at his face, followed by a squirt of holy water from the spray bottle.

"That's for pointing the gun at me." I spun around, gesturing for Sam to follow. "Make sure to lock and close the door behind you and try not to disturb the salt line. If you two are here on a gig, I may actually need it."

Once Dean had made it into the kitchen, I had already cut three slices of pie and was placing them onto plates. Sam was sitting at the kitchen table looking out the window, chewing on a thought. Grabbing three forks, I carried over the plates and set one of them in front of Sam. I handed a plate to Dean as he sat down beside his brother. He tucked into the piece before I had even sat down myself.

"This is some damn good pie," he praised.

"Thanks." I smiled eating my own slice. It was good pie if I did say so myself.

"Now, Lucy, what exactly is going on?" Sam asked, eating his pie at a more normal pace. Dean was choking his down as if it was the last piece of pie he'd ever have.

"With the murders you mean?"

"Murders?" Dean asked with his mouth full. Sam's fork stopped mid-air.

"There was only one when we were researching this morning. Has there been another one?" Sam asked anxiously

"Not exactly," I started. "There's been a string of murders going back nearly three hundred years. Sherlock noticed the pattern. He's brilliant, a genius actually. He was looking through some of the cold cases in the area to find any similarities. It turns out there's been eighteen other murders exactly like Ally Johnson's. In each case the victim's cause of death was a puncture wound to the chest, supposedly to the heart."

"Supposedly?" Sam asked, having completely forgotten about his pie.

"The heart is missing in every single one of the bodies. It's completely gone."

"It could be a werewolf. Sometimes they have a taste for that particular organ."

"I doubt it was a werewolf, Dean." I replied looking at the older of the Winchester brothers. "Werewolves are messy. The bodies we've found and the bodies in the autopsy reports aren't ripped up like an animal attacked them."

"What do you think it was then?" he tested.

"There were traces of sulfur at the crime scene."

"So it's a demon?" Sam questioned, cutting off Dean's next sentence.

"That's what it looks like, but it has to be one heck of a demon to keep this game up for so long." I mused

"If the demon keeps switching bodies, it could go on for as long as it likes." Sam responded.

"Until someone kills the evil bastard," Dean added. He was on his second piece of pie, which he had served himself.

"I have a question, though."

"Shoot." Sam encouraged.

"Is that how demons normally kill people?" I asked rhetorically. I knew that it wasn't a demon's typical style.

Sam pursed his lips, and Dean stopped eating his pie. They looked at each other and shook their heads. "Not any demons we've ever faced."

I nodded. "We should go see Sherlock and John. I think they're at the town's hospital examining the body. I figure you'll want a look too. You should meet them anyway. Sherlock's working on the murder as a case, and he isn't likely to let anyone else in. I'll convince them that you two will be beneficial to the case." I paused for a moment, debating over to warn them about Sherlock. "He… isn't the easiest person to work with, but John will keep him in line."

"That would be great," Sam said sincerely.

"One more minute, I need to finish this pie."

"That's fine. I have to grabsome stuff from upstairs." Pushing back my chair, I left the table to head up the staircase. I was only alone for a minute before I heard heavy foot steps behind me.

"Sam?" I asked without turning around.

"Yea."

"Why are you following me?"

"I uhh," he stuttered. "If there is a demon around, then someone should protect you."

"Ahh." I strode evenly up the last few steps on the staircase and into my room. I left the door open for Sam to come in. There was no use leaving him out, and it wasn't like I was going to change. It was sort of sweet of him actually, but I didn't need protection. I could hold my own against a demon any day.

He hesitated for a moment at the doorframe before coming in to join me.

"Whoa."

"Mhmm," I hummed. I lived in the second largest bedroom in the house. I could have moved into the master bedroom when my parents left me in charge of the house while they lived in a lake house a few hours away, but I liked my own room far too much. I had spent hours upon hours decorating the walls and ceiling with traps and symbols from nearly every culture I could find. Other areas were covered in quotes written in circular Gallifreyan. Colors shone through the dark lines of the symbols and words like stained glass. There were jars of salt lining the windowsill, and a TARDIS replica on the nightstand beside the bed. Books and loose leaf paper littered every available surface and at the center of the storm, sat my laptop.

"This is…" Sam's hazel eyes roamed the walls at a loss for words, as he sat heavily on the mattress.

"Impressive? Intimidating? Wonderful?" I suggested, grabbing my brown leather jacket. It was well worn in with an asymmetric zipper, and I'd never loved a piece of clothing more in my life.

"Insane. I was going to say insane." Sam continued his eyes resumed their wandering path over the walls.

"I'll take that as a compliment." I replied. I grabbed a few of the jars filled with salt from the window and put them into my backpack along with a notebook where I had written every chant pertaining to demons I could find. I also put a general book of mythological creatures, an etched flask of holy water, and my laptop into my bag. Finally I slid an iron ring onto my right index finger. Turning to Sam, I asked, "Ready to return downstairs?"

"Yea. Yes of course, lead the way."

Dean was waiting for us at the front door. He winked at Sam as soon as we reached the bottom of the staircase.

"Dean, don't look at him like that. I'm not interested in either one of you, so stop pretending you've got a chance with me. Now," Ignoring their shocked faces and frozen smiles, I paused for a second to control my inner fangirl. "Can I ride in the Impala or not?"

"Wait," Sam turned around in his seat to face me. I was sitting in the backseat of the Impala, completely content to be driving to a morgue with two characters that had been fictional until they showed up at my door half an hour earlier. I wondered if I should be more concerned with this situation than I was. First off, how were they, along with John and Sherlock, even real?

"What was the name of the detective working on this case, again?" Sam asked, interrupting my thoughts.

"Sherlock," I answered turning my gaze from the window to Sam. His hair wasn't as long as I first took it to be. He wasn't pushing it behind his ears yet. What season were they in?

"Sherlock _Holmes?"_

"A version of him, yes." Sam gaped at me.

"But how can that be? He's fictional!"

"In my world, you're fictional too." I waited for the statement to sink in.

"We're not fictional," Sam laughed. "Look at us! We're real."

"Just as Sherlock is real. Look in my world, you two star in a show called Supernatural. That's why I recognized you when you came to my door."

"So all the symbols on your walls, did you get those from us too?"

"Most of them, but a few of the symbols I found in my own research. I know nearly everything there is to know about you two."

"Sure you do," Dean taunted. "You know nothing about us."

"Where's Cas?" There was no point in beating around the bush. I needed to know what point of time they were in, and how much they knew.

"Cas? I had a girlfriend named Cassie, but I figure she's still back home."

"No. That's not the Cas I'm talking about," I responded. That narrowed it down their time frame considerably, since Cas appeared in season four. At least there weren't any angels to worry about or Sam's demon problems.

"Can I see you anti-possession tattoos?"

"Neither of us have tattoos…That's not a bad idea, though." Sam responded, looking at Dean.

"No it isn't," I had it narrowed down to the beginning of season two, because Sam didn't have the fringe haircut. I missed that one. He used to look so innocent with it. "Now the most important question, do you have the colt?" The car swerved slightly, causing Dean to tighten his grip on the wheel. He was clearly repressing his violent streak.

"How the _hell_ could you possibly know about the colt?" Dean exclaimed after pausing in surprise.

"I told you already. I know nearly everything I could know about you two. I've seen all the episodes. There isn't much you guys could say or do that would really surprise me." I stated matter of fact-ly. "So do you or don't you have the colt?"

"Nope," Dean replied shaking his head. "We don't have it."

"You're lying, Dean. I know you have the colt."

"Fine we have it, but we ain't using it on some minor demon. We need it to kill yellow eyes."

"I know you do, but it would be handy to have just in case." That answer put the brothers squarely in the beginning of season two just as I had suspected. Now that I knew their timeline, I could watch my conversations with them, so I didn't say any spoilers. It was a bit strange, having to be careful not to tell someone their own life's spoilers. I had a new appreciation for Chuck Shurley's character for it.

"This is the place," I pointed at the hospital coming up on our right.

Dean turned into the parking lot without saying a word, and I got the distinct feeling that he didn't trust me one bit. I let out a long breath. How could I get him to trust me? He's going to need to, heck, both of them will need to trust me with whatever we're getting up against. I don't think it's anything they've ever dealt with.

We walked through the front doors where the receptionist, a pleasantly round woman with her hair pulled into a tight bun, asked for some identification. Sam and Dean pulled their badges out instantly. I realized that my ID card was still in my backpack, and I stepped behind the two taller men to retrieve it.

"Hi, I'm Agent Alfred Berkley and this is Agent Fred Stevenson, my partner. We're with the FBI investigating the death of Ally Johnson," I was fairly certain that Dean was correcting the mistake he made with me earlier this morning. I felt the card in the front pocket of my bag and grabbed it just as the receptionist turned her gaze on me.

"Who's that behind you?" The receptionist asked.

"Nancy Stein," I supplied immediately, holding out a college ID card from the nearby university. "I'm working on some research in the labs here."

"I haven't seen you before," the nurse questioned suspiciously, looking intently at my ID card.

"This is the first time I've come to the hospital to do the research. Until now I could do everything on campus, but I wanted to see what being a mortician was like. It's one of the possible career paths I was thinking about. I've examined nearly every cadaver in our labs, but all of those people died of natural causes. I wanted to look into what a murdered body would be like."

"Oh I got you! You're the curious type, aren't you?" I was slightly taken aback by her sudden enthusiasm, but I played along. "I was just like that in college too. A mortician is a good career path. You'll never be out of work, because people just keep dying," she handed my ID back with a laugh. "I'm afraid you might get in the way of the agents, though."

I let my face drop. Turning to Dean, I looked up at him with begging eyes, "I won't be disruptive, I promise. I just really want to see what it's like to work with a different kind of death."

"You should be fine, as long as you don't touch anything." He replied straightening his back.

"Well if that's all settled, go ahead gentlemen and lady. I hope you figure out that poor woman's death."

"Thank you ma'am, we'll do our best," Dean replied, tucking his badge back into his suit pocket.

We walked down the hallway towards the elevator. I've never liked hospitals. They're too white and too clean. I always felt like I was contaminating the sterile walls with my mere presence. I waited impatiently for the elevator doors to open, and the three of us stepped in.

"That was unexpected," Sam noted as soon as the doors shut. "Can I see that ID?" I handed it to him, and he inspected it closely. Dean looked over his brother's shoulder to examine the card as well.

"I can't see a single fault with this ID," Sam marveled as he handed it back to me. "You're just as good as Dean."

"Thank you!" I grinned broadly, resisting the urge to jump up and down in excitement. It wouldn't do well to fangirl in front of two of my favorite characters and scare them away.

"That story wasn't even half bad either." I looked at Dean astounded. I hadn't actually known that he was paying attention to the lie I told the receptionist.

"People think they're compassionate when they help out poor college kids find their passions. It makes them feel good about themselves, and it gets me into places I couldn't have been otherwise."

"So you've done this before?" Sam questioned, raising his eyebrows.

"Well… no. I actually haven't. Most of my adventures take place in fictional worlds. I've been too scared to make my own… that's why I got in on this one as soon as it started."

"It may get dangerous." Sam warned. He put his hand on my shoulder protectively, as if to console me. "We don't want you to get hurt."

"Like I said, I haven't _been_ on an adventure. That doesn't mean I haven't prepared for one. I've been waiting for this my whole life for something like this." I beamed at the two hunters.

"You need to go kid-" started Dean.

"Lucy, my name is Lucy, and I'm not a kid. I'm twenty-one years old. I'm barely any younger than Sam. " I interjected.

"Okay. Whatever. Look Lucy, you don't know what you're getting into, and you could get seriously hurt. We aren't having you die on our watch, and we aren't going to babysit you."

I closed my eyes in an attempt to stop the wave of rage I was about to unleash on Dean. Taking a deep breath to compose myself, I opened my eyes and stared straight at the shorter hunter. "I know more about what we're getting into more than you do, Dean. Who told you all that information in the first place? Oh right, I did. Like it or not, you need me. I'm the only one who understands this town, and I know the lives of all of the fictional people that keep randomly showing up. I'm as intertwined in this are you are. I am staying, and that's all that needs to be said. Understood?" I took a step back away from Dean and stared him down.

Dean looked to Sam for support, but only got a pair of raised eyebrows and a shrug in response. He eyed me again, stepping closer. "Well if you're so prepared, sweet heart, what have you got in the backpack?"

"Salt, holy water, notebooks with incantations, a mythology book, and some other stuff to help with research, and don't call me sweetheart," I replied my voice dripping with disdain.

"No weapon then? See? You're unprepared. You shouldn't be here." His eyes were almost deadly serious. Every inch of his stance radiated tension. He jabbed my chest with his index finger saying, "What if someone attacked you right now? What would you do without a weapon? You'd get _KILLED!_ And I'm not going to be the one left accountable for your life. I've got enough trouble looking out for my own brother as it is. I won't add another person to the mix."

"First off," I said grabbing his hand by the palm of his thumb and twisting it, catching him off balance. I took that opportunity to sweep the leg that was supporting most of his weight out from under him. He fell to the elevator floor, and I followed him, still holding his hand in a wrist lock. I redirected his arm a bit, making him roll over to keep it from dislocating. Pushing his wrist up his back toward the same shoulder, I put him into a shoulder lock so he couldn't move without hurting himself even more. Quickly replacing my hands with a knee to hold his arm in place, I based my other leg out to the side. Dean aimed a kick at my head, but I was out of its range already. His other arm lay useless trapped under his body weight and mine. I hadn't meant for that to happen, but I'd take what I could get. All of this took only a few seconds, and I finished my sentence saying, "I don't need a weapon to fight. But if I did, I certainly wouldn't reach it in time if I kept it in my backpack. No. I'd keep my weapon on my person." I slid my silver knife out from one of the unnoticeable slits in my jacket, and pointed it at his throat. "That way I could access it within a moment's notice."

At that moment the doors of the elevator glided opened in front ofJohn Watson and Sherlock Holmes, who seemed to be in the middle of some heated discussion. John was probably trying to convince Sherlock to eat something. However, he ceased talking as he took in the scene before him. The army doctor's eyes rose so high in astonishment that they were almost concealed by his receding hairline. Sherlock's expression was much subtler, changing from bored to mildly amused. I stood up and slid the knife back into its hiding place, and offered Dean a hand. He took it and hauled himself back into a standing position, saying with his usual cheekiness "I let you do that." Sam was suppressing a laugh from the corner of the elevator at seeing his brother get bested by a girl half his size. I noted that he hadn't done anything to aid Dean during our scuffle. He was probably too shocked or thought Dean deserved it. In either case, I'm glad he hadn't interfered. I wanted Dean to know that I was extremely capable of handling myself.

Refocusing on my surroundings, I smiled at John, whose jaw had dropped as he processed the scene in front of him. Sherlock, on the other hand, took one look at Dean and rhetorically asked, "You didn't make the foolish mistake of underestimating your opponent, did you Mr. Winchester?"


	2. Chapter 2: Sherlock and John

"Hey Sherlock, John," I greeted, smiling.

"Morning Lucy," John replied. He pursed his lips and stuck his neck out a tiny bit, obviously phrasing a thought and asked, "What exactly happened here?"

"Oh. Dean was underestimating my level of preparedness and tried to convince me that this case was too dangerous for me to handle. I figured a demonstration was the best way to prove it."

"Ahh," John nodded. "I hope you didn't hurt the poor fellow."

"Don't worry. He's fine." I glanced back at Sam and Dean, who were both waiting to be introduced. "Oh introductions! Sorry. Sam," I gestured to the taller of the two hunters and then to his brother, "and Dean Winchester meet Sherlock Holmes and John Watson."

Dean raised his fingers in a hello, while Sam extended his hand out to the detective and his blogger. "Are you really the great detective Sherlock Holmes?"

"Obviously," answered Sherlock. "And you are Sam Winchester. Tell me Sam what do you hunt?"

"How could you-?" Sam was interrupted by Sherlock, who launched into his deduction speech.

"You have scars from knives and similar weapons. They could be from anything, but they span your entire body, and they aren't all from the same time. You can tell, because some are fainter than others. Therefore, the scars must be an occupational hazard. Your stance implies someone who is confident, but isn't an authority. You stay in less than optimal motel rooms most of the time, judging by how you keep rubbing the cramp in your neck" Sherlock pointed at Sam's hand, which was, indeed. massaging the back of his neck. "A traveler with scars, weapons as there is some remaining gunpowder on your fingers, and little money, I take it you must be hunting something. So what is it?"

"Wow," Sam swallowed nervously. He glanced back at Dean, who nodded in response to the question in Sam's eyes. Answering honestly, Sam watched Sherlock's expression closely. "We hunt ghosts, demons, werewolves, vampires- basically anything supernatural that's killing human beings for their own purposes."

"They don't exist," Sherlock replied instantly. "I haven't ever seen any proof of it."

"People like us destroy any reliable proof, so the general population doesn't start looking for them." Sam answered.

"Ghosts, demons, hell even djinn are hard enough for us to take care of, plus we know how this stuff works. Anyone else will get overwhelmed by them, so it's better to try and keep everyone in the dark as much as possible." Dean added in.

Sherlock shook his head, "John, I think you should check if either of these boys have concussions. Perhaps Lucy hit their heads harder than she thought." I rolled my eyes. I would do no such thing.

"Have you ever had an unsolved case?" Sam blurted out just as Sherlock was turning away. "A case where you knew, you _knew,_ the victim was killed, but you couldn't find any way to prove it."

Sherlock's eyes darted to John's, roving his face for any sign of agreement. John looked up the ceiling, thinking for a moment, then returned Sherlock's gaze and nodded. The detective rounded on Sam, looking down at him (despite the fact that Sam was nearly a head taller than him). "Do you mean a suicide that most definitely was not a suicide."

"Yeah that could happen. Sometimes ghosts will kill people in an echo in the way they were killed."

"Can ghosts… hang people?" John asked addressing Sam, but looking at Sherlock.

"Yeah," Sam answered. "The ghost could tie the rope around the victim's neck, and make it looked like the victim did it."

"Ohh!" Sherlock was looking down at John, but his gaze had retreated to somewhere inside that brilliant mind. Neither John nor I were concerned by Sherlock's sudden absence, but both hunters were anxious.

"Is he okay?" Dean asked quickly, moving to see the detective's eyes more clearly. He noted that they weren't black, just a strange mixture or blue, green, and grey that seemed alien.

John shook his head fondly. "Sorry. He does that sometimes. He doesn't care if it's the middle of a conversation. If he needs to retrieve a fact from his mind palace, then he's going to do it. I'm usually the one stuck apologizing for his lack of social skills."

"So he's not possessed? This is normal?" Sam questioned.

"Pretty much," John nodded.

"I feel bad for the bastard that has to live with this guy," Dean added backing away from Sherlock. I held back a laugh at the look of disgust that Sam shot his brother.

"It's not easy I'll tell you that," John said scratching his ear. "He leaves body parts in the fridge and plays the violin at three o'clock in the bloody morning. I don't mind living with him too much, though. The cases are fun, and I like blogging about them."

"So are you two a thing?" Dean asked. I should be getting some type of award for holding in all of those screams and squeals. Of course John and Sherlock were a thing! They just… hadn't quite realized it yet.

"Um, no. No we aren't going out." John answered shifting from foot to foot. Sam caught the glare I was sending John's way and looked at me perplexed. I rolled my eyes, motioning to talk about it later.

"That's why there was no chair, John!" Sherlock exclaimed, catching us off guard. "I told him! I told Lestrade it was a murder. If the victim had hanged herself she'd need a chair or a box, something to push out from under her feet. There wasn't anything she could have used when we got the crime scene. There weren't even any fingerprints or disturbances in the dust on the ceiling beams. That must explain it! Why didn't I see it before? It had to be a ghost. Oh, it makes so much more sense," Sherlock's eyes radiated delight as he looked at all of us.

"No shit, Sherlock." Dean mocked. I burst into laughter. I had waiting for someone to say that. Sam chuckled too, and John smirked.

Sherlock didn't seem to care looking down at his phone, typing away with intense focus. Sam, once he stopped laughing, seemed relieved that the detective was taking him and his brother seriously. I was a bit surprised myself, but Sherlock did like new information. I could only imagine the number of hours of supernatural talk and experiments John will have to endure in the upcoming months. Meanwhile, John looked over his friend's shoulder to see what he was typing.

"No. NO! Sherlock I am not acting as ghost bait for your blooming experiment!"

"It's for science John. I have to know! I need to prove they exist!" Sherlock whined.

"No. Absolutely not."

I stifled another laugh, stepping into the conversation before it could elevate any further. "John, were you and Sherlock leaving? I wanted to see your findings, and these guys need to be updated on the murders. I think they could prove helpful."

"We were on our way to the diner across the street. I don't think Sherlock's consumed anything besides a cup of tea this morning, but we could spare another few minutes." John said easily.

Sherlock spun on his toe already half way down the hall. "You're all so slow. Hurry up. I have new theories to test!"

When the rest of us entered the morgue, Sherlock was already standing over the body.

"Put those on," he said gesturing to a box containing latex gloves. Everyone took a pair and approached the body. Ally Johnson had barely been a sixteen year old girl. Honestly, I was only a five years older than her. I easily could have been the lying on the table instead of her if I had been in the wrong place at the wrong time. I grimaced a bit, but held back most of the other emotions rising up in my stomach.

"You said she died of a puncture wound of the chest, right?" Sam asked addressing me.

"Yeah, well, she died because her heart was ripped out. The puncture wound was just the indicator of that." I replied glancing at Sam. His hair really was cuter in season two before he grew it all out, I decided. I missed the fringe that he had in season one, but this wasn't too far from it. Plus he hadn't reached all the events that tore his heart to pieces to become the sad man I saw on the screen nowadays. It was a nice change.

"Right," Sam approached the corpse. "Are there any other wounds? Any sign of a struggle?"

"There's no sign of a struggle. The wound has a pretty clean entry and exit. If she were struggling it would have been a lot messier," Doctor Watson replied.

"Was there any sedative in the blood stream?" I asked Sherlock.

"None that I could find."

"What about sulfur?" Sam asked.

"In the blood stream? No. I would have noticed that." Sherlock circled around the body. "There's something I'm missing though. The wound- it doesn't look like a knife or any sort of claw."

Dean leaned in closer. I saw him make a face at the body, which made me feel slightly better. At least I wasn't the only one a bit squeamish around dead bodies. "It's not any wound I've seen before. It looks like someone stuck her threw with a power drill, but pattern the tissues ripped in doesn't match those of a power drill."

"What do you think, Lucy?" Sam asked.

"I- uhh- haven't looked that closely at it." I responded. Sam looked at me curiously his brown eyes going softer for a second.

"It's okay if the body freaks you out." He said, trying to judge my hesitance to approach the dead girl.

"I'm not freaked out by it. It just… smells bad." It was a weak argument, but I didn't care. It was better than admitting to some vulnerability. Snapping my gloves, I walked toward the body determinedly. I had only watched Sherlock and John examine the wound before. I had just stood off to the side, watching them work. I bent over the wound to see it more clearly. It went straight through to the girl's back and was sort of funnel shaped. The exit of the object out her back was fairly small, only an inch in diameter. The entry, however, was six or seven inches wide.

Looking closer at the entry portion of the wound I realized it didn't have much of a circular shape, as I had been imagining. Instead, it looked like the bite mark that a pair of scissors would make.

"Sherlock, do you see that?" I asked pointing at a line of flesh near where the heart would have been. It had more ripped up tissue than anywhere else in or around the wound.

"It's nice to see that not everyone is as idiotic as Anderson." He snapped immediately, eyes dancing. I took it as a compliment. Stepping closer he pointed to the line of tissue I had mentioned, "It looks like a second bite. If there had been teeth marks they'd be here and here." The detective gestured to a small space both above and below the wound. "However, there are not any teeth marks. Instead there's just a slightly deeper puncture of flesh from those two areas."

"So you think it is a bite mark, but the animal doesn't have teeth?"

"Or the animal has teeth further back in its mouth."

"That narrows down the range considerably," Dean noted sarcastically. I disagreed. The information did help us rule out most, if not all humanoid creatures as well as some nastier animal based ones.

I was beginning to step away from the body when something else caught my eye. I leaned in closer to the girl's left hand. There was a small, very precise cut in the shape of an 'N' on the pad of her thumb.

"The other victims had a letter marked on their body as well," Sherlock said noticing my gaze.

"When were you going to mention that?" I asked.

"Eventually," Sherlock said waving his hand.

"Does it spell out anything?" Sam asked leaning in closer to inspect the hand. I backed up so he would have more space. I moved to the side of the room where John and Dean where both leaning up against the wall. I took off the latex gloves and washed my hands (twice just in case) and joined them. I leaned beside Dean. I knew Sherlock would glare if I stood next to John. It was almost endearing how protective the detective was of his blogger, but he was an idiot to realize that I wasn't a threat.

"Not that we can tell. It just looks like a jumble of random letters." John answered, breaking my internal monologue.

"Do you remember them?"

"No, but I wrote them down." He took a piece of paper out of his jacket pocket. John went to hand it to Sam, but he shook his head.

"My hands are covered in blood right now. I shouldn't touch anything clean at the moment. Hand it over to Lucy. I'll be there in a second." Sam went over to the corner of the room to dispose of his gloves, while Dr. Watson reached across Dean to hand me the sheet of paper.

I took it, but a quick glance at Dean stopped me. His face was tense and his eyes burned a hole in Sam's back. "Here," I said casually, poking one of his hands folded across his chest with the paper. "You should be the one holding this. My hands tend to shake when I'm trying to hold something still. I'll just look over your shoulder."

Dean looked at me surprised. I shrugged in response. I knew Dean was jealous that Sam picked me over him, and I couldn't have that. As promised I leaned my head over Dean's shoulder and he held out the paper so I could see.

" Y N"

As far as I could see, there were only seventeen letters. I pointed this out to John, and he nodded his head. "Sherlock said the same thing, but two of the bodies had no records of a letter being written anywhere."

"Idiots, there were no letters in the autopsy report? None?"

"None," John replied.

"Are these in chronological order?" Dean asked. I stared at him for a moment. That was going to be my next question.

"Umm," John's eyebrows lowered as he tried to remember, "I think so. Yes."

"Can you insert were the blank bodies were?" I asked.

"One moment," John pulled out a notebook from his pockets and started flipping through it. "Right. The first blank body was in 1794, landing it between the S and the Y. The second one," the pages of his notebook shuffled as he found the second blank, "is between the U and the N."

Dean dug in his pockets for a nonexistent pencil. I smiled a little and handed him one from my backpack. He took it, adding in the blanks to the series of letters.

" - - N"

"Does that mean anything to you?" He asked handing me back the pencil.

"It just looks like a mess of letters. Why even put in the effort to do that in the first place?"

"I don't know," it was nice to see that Dean and John looked just as confused as I was.

A sound like a growling underwater monster broke our locked attention on the paper. I heard the noise again, but felt a clench in my belly as well. I looked down at my stomach, feeling my cheeks go red. "Sorry. That was… me."

I heard Sam laughing as he walked across the room, gloves removed and hands cleaned. Dean smiled, though I wasn't sure if it was at Sam's laughter or the noises my stomach was capable of making. I'd guess the former honestly.

"Have you eaten at all today?" John questioned me. I could see his doctor side kicking in.

"I had some pie earlier." Technically, it was true, but I had forgone breakfast and lunch to continue reading.

"Dude, you barely ate half your slice. You were talking most of the time," Sam criticized. Dean didn't say anything, but the horrified look on his face told me that not finishing that slice of pie was an action close to sinning in his books.

"I was a little distracted at the time," I answered back defensively. "Maybe we should start heading over to the diner?"

"Sure thing," John replied. "Sherlock!"

Sherlock was standing by the sink, unmoving. John sighed and ambled towards the detective. Putting his hand on the taller man's shoulder John repeated, "Sherlock. Sherlock we're going to get some lunch, and you have to come too."

"Do we still have the autopsies and crime scene reports," Sherlock asked immediately emerging from his stupor.

"Yeah, over there," John gestured to one of the tables I was standing by with a pile of folders sitting in the middle of it. "But Sherlock we're going out for lunch now. You need to eat."

"I never eat when I'm on a case, John. You know that." Sherlock headed straight for the papers. I moved over to the desk first and grabbed all the folders. Gripping them tightly to my chest, I waited to see what Sherlock would do. He looked at me then back at John as if asking him to remove the obstacle in the way of his information.

"I'll give these back to you at the diner," I said simply. I turned on my heel and walked out of the room.

Once I was in the hallway, I didn't hear any noise in the room for almost a full twenty seconds. It wasn't until I was nearing the elevator that I heard all four of the boys rushing out of the room. I pushed the up button on the elevator and waited for it to come down.

It sounded like they were all running. I turned around to watch them approach. They instantly stopped, pretending that they had been walking casually down the hall the entire time. I rolled my eyes. Idiots. All of them were idiots. The elevator dinged, opening the doors.

"Hurry up guys, before the doors close!" I yelled. They all did a weird half jogging- half power walking skip to the elevator. I held the door open for them, my other hand still gripping the folders. When the last person, John, was finally inside, I let the doors close.

The elevator wasn't exactly roomy. I was squished between Sam and the buttons directing where the elevator went. I didn't even have enough room to take my backpack off as I had planned.

"Sam, would you mind slipping these into my backpack? I don't want the nurse to think I'm stealing evidence from a current investigation."

"You are." Sherlock stated from the corner. John grimaced at him, but I couldn't help but fangirl over a moping Sherlock. He was just so… childish. It was wonderful to see this side of his personality in comparison to the genius extraordinaire.

"I don't mind," Sam answered, after verifying that he was out of Sherlock's reach. I handed him the folders and turned my back so he could put them into my bag. I felt the weight added to my backpack and the zipper put back into its original space.

"Thanks," I smiled.

"Don't mention it."

We left the hospital without a hitch. The receptionist really seemed to like me for whatever reason, wishing me luck on the way out the door. We were on our way to the diner when Dean heard a noise from a back alleyway.

They both pulled out their guns and approached. I followed right behind with John and Sherlock on my tail. The all too familiar noise echoed again. I nearly overcome with joy. The TARDIS noise was getting louder, and I could see the blue box starting to appear right where Sam was.

"Sam watch out!" I yelled. He turned around quickly, but didn't move from the spot. I huffed a breath, resolving to shove him out of the way. I was fairly certain that the TARDIS would just take whomever it landed on into its console room, but I figured it was better to bet that with my own life instead of Sam's. I ran over to the hunter, pushing him out of the way just as the box finished materializing right where I stood.


	3. The Doctor, Lunch, and an Anagram

The TARDIS interior surrounded me when I opened my eyes. I hadn't even realized I closed them when I pushed Sam out of the way. I blinked my eyes a bit taking in the console. It wasn't the bright orange I had been hoping for, but instead organic tones of bronze and green. Standing quietly, I heard the machine starting to power down now that the Doctor had parked it.

The Doctor! But… which one? I glanced around the TARDIS, my eyes finally landing on a pair of dirty converse. I raised my head slowly taking in the appearance of the tenth doctor. He wasn't talking or running about, though. It struck that he must have just lost a companion. My heart sank at the thought. Praying I was wrong, I glanced around the room. The Doctor was still fiddling around with one of the switches too consumed in his thoughts to notice me yet. As I continued to watch, the Doctor made a face like something was wrong.

"This isn't where you were supposed to land." He whispered to the TARDIS, bending closer to the screen on the console.

"It looks you brought us into another universe again. You're really not supposed to do that, darling." He continued to flip a few of the switches, but the TARDIS didn't respond. Stopping he asked aloud, "Why haven't you powered down? Last time this happened it took too much energy, and you nearly died on me."

"It could be that she got pulled through somehow." I suggested.

The Doctor spun his head to see me at once. "What?"

"Hello." I waved.

"_What?_" The Doctor's eyebrows were squeezed together trying to explain my presence. "_WHAT?!"_

"Hello," I said again. Any other usual conversational words fled my head as I stared at the Doctor. Out of all the strange fictional characters to show up, I never would have guessed he would. Everyone had been human, but the Doctor was most definitely not human. Somehow, it seemed almost impossible that he would appear as well.

"How did you get in here?"

"You landed on. Well, technically I let you land on me. I was pushing Sam out of the way, but I didn't quite make it out of the way myself."

"Ooh." The Doctor responded. "That's good to know. I've never landed on a person before."

"Wow, 900 years and you've never landed on a person. That's pretty incredible."

"Well," the Doctor smiled at me. "Wait how do you know my age?"

"You're on a television show I watch back at home called Doctor Who."

"Oh that's a brilliant title. I like that." I laughed at the Doctor's amusement of being the main character of a television show. "So you know everything about me then?" He was clearly, unfazed by the turn of events; although, I really shouldn't have expected anything less form the Doctor.

"Well I know a lot of things about you, but not everything. The show couldn't possibly cover everything."

"Fair enough," the Doctor slid his hands into his trouser pockets. "What about you then? Who are you? Because I know I've never seen you before."

"Lucy Peverall. I haven't got a middle name, because my parents were too lazy to think of one." I laughed. "At least that's what they always told me."

"Well Lucy with no middle name, would you like to have a look around."

"Of course! But Doctor," I started, shifting from foot to foot. "You looked sad when I first came in. Who- Who did you just lose?"

"It doesn't matter. I lose everyone that travels with me." The pain in his eyes broke my heart, and tears threatened to spill over my eyelids.

"Was it Donna?" I asked, my voice barely above a whisper. I knew I was pushing the time lord to face emotions he usually kept so well hidden, but never faced losing companions well.

The Doctor nodded, letting his head hang. It was strange to see the magnificent alien lacking his usual energy. I stepped closer to Doctor and pulled him into a hug without a second thought. Stroking the soft hair on back of head, I murmured, "I'm sorry."

His hands hung loose at his sides for a moment, before wrapping around me. "It's not your fault."

"No, but I can still be sorry," I replied into the collar of his suit.

I felt him nod again. After a moment, he held me out at his arm's reach. "Thank you." He said genuinely. "Now, want to go explo-"

The Doctor was cut off by someone banging on the side of the TARDIS. I knew he was counting the number of knocks he heard, but he only got up to three before the hits stopped. I could visually see the time lord relax. It had been a while since I thought about the tenth doctor's regeneration, but I remembered about the four knocks he lived in fear of every day. I wanted to apologize for those too, but I was caught off guard by a noise joining the second round of thuds.

"LUCY!" I could hear faintly. It sounded like Sam, but I couldn't really be sure. The Doctor was rigid, trying to figure out what was going on. His hands were still on my shoulders, completely forgotten.

Another noise drew our attention to the door. A clicking sound, like the lock was being picked. Neither of us had time to respond before the doors flew open, and Sam burst through them swiftly, holding his gun at eye level. The Doctor reached into his pocket for his sonic screwdriver, before realizing it was still sitting in his chair by the console.

Sam stopped dead in his tracks at the sight of the room, causing Dean to run straight into his back. He stumbled forward a bit, before shaking his head as if to clear it. The Doctor watched the two men with both of his eyebrows now raised nearly half-way up his forehead.

"Do you know them?" The Doctor asked, leaning toward me to speak into my ear.

I nodded, and he looked at the hunters again.

"I suddenly feel much more insecure about the last few hundred years of time traveling. Did they really just pick that lock?" He asked, lowering his voice.

"If it's any consolation they pick locks all the time. They're very good at it."

"What kind of people do you hang out with?" The Doctor accused, jokingly. I could see a hint of underlying concern in the statement. I was about to explain the situation, but Sam's yell cut me off.

"Lucy!" Sam called out. I felt my chest swell a little at the anxiousness in his voice. His eyes were darting around the TARDIS as he shouted even louder, "LUCY!"

Before I had a chance to respond, Sam's eyes were on me and the Doctor. He looked at me first, probably judging if I was hurt or not, then pointed his gun at the time lord. "Put your hands up!" Sam growled.

"Yes, of course." The Doctor let go of my shoulders and held his hands above his head. By now Dean had gotten over the shock of a bigger on the inside room, and he was pointing his gun at the Doctor as well.

I glanced at Sam and Dean, then at the Doctor, before stepping between the two parties directly in front of the guns. "Chill out guys. This is the Doctor."

"Doctor Who?" Dean inquired, lowering his gun slightly. Sam lowered his altogether, not wanting to take a chance and hit me by accident.

"Just the Doctor," replied the time lord. He wiggled his fingers while he put his other hand in his pocket. "Hello!"

"Do you know this guy?" Sam asked, our green eyes meeting. Coming from anyone else, I would have said Sam sounded… hurt. As if I had betrayed him in some way. I'm not quite sure how I had managed to do that, but I pushed those thoughts aside. They were too distracting.

"I know him just about as much as I know you." I replied. Sam and Dean understood my meaning instantly, but the Doctor frowned.

"What do you mean by that? You just met me."

"Exactly, Sam and Dean turned up at my door several hours ago, and I ran into Sherlock and John yesterday afternoon." I paused for a moment. Turning back to Sam and Dean, I inquired where John and Sherlock were.

"Just outside the door," Dean answered. "We weren't sure what was going on. One minute there was nothing in the alleyway besides that weird noise, the next moment you had pushed Sammy to the ground and a police box was standing right where you had been. We looked around the box, expecting you to be under it, but there was nothing. Sam was insistent about taking a look in here, so we had John and Sherlock looking around in the alleyway for you in case we couldn't find you."

"I'll go inform them that I'm fine then." I walked out toward the door. Dean followed me toward the door, his shoes echoing in the cavernous room. He placed a hand on my shoulder, making me face him.

"Did you know that you were going to end up in this place instead being squished onto the pavement like a bug?"

"Not really. It was sort of a hunch."

"You weren't sure if you'd survive it landing on you?"

"I was 85% sure that I would be fine." I didn't understand why he needed to know any of this, but I complied anyway.

"So when you pushed Sammy out of the way, you were willing to die in his place?"

"I was." I replied, fidgeting. "You all are much more important that I am."

"I'm not more import—" The hunter shook his head. "You would have died for Sam?"

"Chances are I'd die for any of you, Dean." The hunter nodded with a look of disbelief in his eyes. I knew he of all people would understand, even if he didn't quite believe me yet. I'd lost count of how many times Dean had been willing to sacrifice himself for the sake of his younger brother.

"Thanks for watching out for Sam," Dean muttered.

"You would have done the same for him."

"Yeah, I would have," Dean paused collecting his thoughts. Finally he looked me in the eyes and said, "You're not too bad kid."

"Of course I'm not. I'm the best person you're ever going to meet." I smirked. Dean allowed a laugh to escape from his mouth, before returning to Sam's side. I turned back in the direction of the TARDIS doors and opened them. Looking from side to side, I didn't see John or Sherlock.

"John! Sherlock!" I yelled. "I'm safe, see? You can stop looking around for me now."

John appeared from around the corner, breaking into a relieved grin. "It's nice to see you're okay, Lucy."

"I knew you were fine." Sherlock added in materializing from behind John. "What are you still doing in the Police Box? It must be a bit cramped in there. Unless you like that sort of situation, in which case the tall one has been eyeing you."

"Sherlock!" John exclaimed. I was taken off by Sherlock's comment about Sam, but it didn't matter if I liked Sam or not. Sooner or later he was going to get brought back into his show, and I would never see him again. I would never see any of them again. I pushed the pain of that thought down. No time to dwell on it now.

"It's fine, John." I said emerging from my thoughts. "You guys should come see this! We found another person like you two. He goes by the Doctor."

"Preposterous, John is the only doctor here." Sherlock responded immediately, approaching the doors to the TARDIS. I thought I caught John blushing and smiled on his behalf. "I can't fathom what's so important—oh. Oh, well that is interesting." Sherlock trailed off after sticking his head in the TARDIS, leaning back he looked at the Police Box.

"That's not possible," he muttered, circling the TARDIS.

"What's he going on about this time?" John questioned, taking a look into the TARDIS himself. Unlike Sherlock, John stepped through the door. His voice was small in amazement, as he whispered, "it's bigger on the inside."

"And you must be the Doctor. Lucy's just told us about you." John said extending his hand to the time lord. The Doctor shook it. Sam and Dean were still hovering behind him, ready to jump into action if the Doctor proved to be harmful.

"And you are?" He asked, looking behind John.

"Doctor John Watson of the Fifth Northumberland Fusiliers, and this is Sherlock Holmes, consulting detective." John gestured to the door as Sherlock walked through.

"It's another dimension," Sherlock proclaimed. I have to say the man's timing is impeccable. "There has to be another dimension in here. There's no other explanation."

"I'd say that's about right. She's called the TARDIS- best ship in the universe," the time lord said, smiling broadly. "You must be Sherlock Holmes. I'm the Doctor."

"Do you honestly want me to believe that's your name?" Sherlock retorted. I saw John covered his face with a hand.

"Nooo. No, I don't, because it's not my real name. However, it is the name that I go by."

"Ahh." Sherlock's quick eyes took in the Doctor, trying to determine who the man was by his own means. His eyes eventually landed on the time lord's neck, focusing on the double pulse beating through the arteries. Furrowing his eyebrows in slight confusion, Sherlock's eyes met the Doctor's again. "You aren't human."

"Nope," the Doctor responded grinning, putting on his glasses.

"What are you?"

"I'm a time lord - the last one in fact."

"Is he from a television show as well?" Sherlock inquired, turning to me abruptly.

"He's from a show called Doctor Who."

"What does he do?" John asked.

"He travels through space and time, saving the world every few episodes. If not every episode." No one else was talking, apparently absorbing all the new information.

"Time and space you said?" John asked me.

"Yep."

"He could teach you about the solar system, Sherlock." John teased his friend. Sherlock glared at the blogger. He was about to ask the Doctor something when I cut him off.

"Since we're probably just going to continue talking, can we go to the diner please? I'm starving."

"Yeah, that's a good idea. We should probably go get lunch," Sam agreed.

"I'll just tag along then, Lucy? If it's okay with you?" The Doctor looked uncertain, turning to face me.

The diner was about a block away still. I walked quickly, because I actually was really hungry. The last thing I remember eating, besides the pie, was some left over Chinese food after I got home from discussing the case with Sherlock and John last night.

Someone had caught up to me. I could hear his footsteps next to mine. I saw his white converse hitting the sidewalk next to my red ones. I didn't say anything, waiting for the time lord to speak.

"I'm all for having friends," the Doctor started, "but your friends seem… strange."

"How so?" I asked.

"Well two of them carry around guns-"

"Three actually, John just hides his well. He doesn't take it out unless someone is in immediate danger. You can see just barely see its outside under his jacket hem."

"Three of your friends carry around guns then, and the other one is dangerous. Don't you know about Sherlock Holmes?"

"Their all dangerous, Doctor, even you're dangerous. I'm looking for some danger. I've read about adventures my whole life, and now I'm finally getting to go on one of my own."

"We're all guys, though, and we're all older than you. You're acting like it isn't weird, but to any onlooker it's very strange." The Doctor continued.

I could see where he was going with this now. To any onlooker our group would appear very odd, and he or she would be concerned for my safety, since I was the only girl. However, I knew that I would never come to harm by the hand of one of these people.

"Doctor, they're my friends. I know they seem dangerous, but you have to trust me. They've been there when no one else was. I'd feel down, really down to the point where I didn't think living was worth it. I'd turn the television on to an episode of Sherlock, or Supernatural, or Doctor Who, and it would help me keep going. These shows cheered me up when no one else could." I looked earnestly at the Doctor, willing him to believe me. "I may not have met any of them before yesterday, but I trust everyone in this group completely. They may not know me or trust me for that matter, but I know them, possibly better than they know themselves. I know your past, your present, and your future, though I won't be talking about any futures."

The Doctor looked unconvinced, so I continued, "I can hold my own against them if I need to. I've taken Dean down already, because he was underestimating my abilities. You could even ask him, if you like."

The Doctor looked suspicious for a second, before turning backwards to face Dean. The hunter had apparently been listening to the conversation, because he backed me up immediately. Winking at me, he said, "She definitely beat me up, Doc. I wouldn't mess with her."

"Honestly, sir. None of us would hurt Lucy, and if we did she would hurt us right back. You're just going to have to trust us." Sam added in with a shrug. "Plus she saved my life. She pushed me out of the TARDIS's path when you were landing it. Dean said that she wasn't even sure that she'd end up inside the console. She could have easily been killed. I owe her my life."

"I have a feeling many of us will owe our lives to her by the time this case is solved." Sherlock predicted. I was stunned my Sam and Sherlock's comments. I wasn't entirely sure how I had earned their respect, but I felt privileged that they thought of me so highly.

The Doctor nodded, a smile crossing his lips. Still walking backward, the time lord turned his head to look sideways at me, "I think you have proven your point, Lucy. Your friends seem more than trustworthy."

"I told you they were. There's the diner," I pointed toward a small building with a sign that gave the impression it was made in the fifties. An open sign hung in the window as we approached the eatery. My stomach growled again, reminding me how hungry I was. Red paint flaked off onto my fingers as I pushed the door to the diner open, stepping on the wooden floor inside the building. Not many of the tables were occupied, and those that were held older couples.

"Hello, can I help you?" The hostess asked me.

"Table for six, please, preferably in the back," I responded, fiddling with the zipper on my jacket. The hostess nodded, grabbed six menus, and led us to a booth in the back of the dinner. I didn't go to this diner too often, because there was another one closer to where I lived. I scanned the menu. I had been here a few times, though. The place was best known for its breakfasts, serving pancakes until they closed at five.

"Your server will be here in a moment. Since you all look new, I should tell you that breakfast is served all day 'round here. In case you're craving French Toast at three in the afternoon."

"Thank you, Tiffany." The Doctor said graciously, reading off of her nametag. He slid into the seat next to me, while Sam took the seat across from me. I saw Dean debating whether or not to take the seat next to Sam, or let John and Sherlock sit next to each other. He evidently decided to take the seat next to the Doctor, allowing John to sit next to Sam and giving Sherlock the end. I saw John shoot Dean a grateful look. My inner fangirl squealed a little bit at the opportunity to watching Sherlock and John sitting next to each to each other.

Everyone grew quite while looking at his or her menus. I was leaning toward a stack of Belgium waffles, when the waitress came over. She was about the same age as me with brown hair, which fell over her right shoulder, and very well done make-up. I felt instantly inferior in her presence, but I suppressed those emotions from showing on my face. Instead, I straightened my back, running my hand through my choppy black hair.

"Hi! My name is Jennifer, and I'll be your waitress today. What would y'all like to drink?"

"Three teas, two sodas, and one hot chocolate," I piped up from the corner with pretend confidence.

"Is that what everyone wanted?" She looked around the table. Everyone nodded a little dumbfounded that I'd gotten their orders right. Except for Dean, who addressed the waitress, "I'd actually like a beer, instead of a soda."

I glared at the hunter. Dean wasn't quite an alcoholic yet, but given enough time he'll become one. I made a resolution to keep Dean from drinking as long as I could. However, I didn't have time to talk Dean out of the beer, before the waitress shook her head, saying "sorry we don't serve alcohol here. Is the soda fine?"

"Yeah, the soda will be fine," Dean replied slumping back in the booth.

"Well if everyone is good with their drinks, I'll be back in a few minutes to take your orders."

"So you really weren't kidding when you said you knew us." Sam looked at me amazed.

I shrugged, blushing at the compliment. "Don't expect me to order lunch for you all. I don't know you that well." I earned a laugh from about half the table. Sherlock smirked, but I could tell he was amused as well.

"Did the Winchesters explain anything to you while I was getting John and Sherlock?"I questioned the Doctor when the laughter had died down.

"I know about the murders and most of the details about them." He responded. "I'll help if you like. I've done an awful lot of running after aliens in my time. I doubt demons would be much different."

"That would be good, I think. We may be up against more than we realize." I sat back against the red plastic seating, staring at the men around the table nodding in agreement.

"I've got drinks y'all," Jennifer called out, approaching our table. I noticed that another button on her polo had been undone since she had taken our drink orders. I felt my face going red either in embarrassment for noticing or anger at her flirting with the fictional characters I found. Jennifer probably had no idea who they were.

I saw Sherlock roll his eyes and face away from the waitress, pretending to be intensely focused on his cup of tea that had just been placed in front of him. Dean also seemed to have noticed the undone button as well, and he was winked at the Jennifer. I heard Sam groan and cover his eyes with a hand. I kicked him under the table, causing him to look up.

"I bet you my left sock that Dean isn't the one she's interested in." Sam glanced at the girl, sizing her up.

"I bet you my right sock Dean will be the one to leave with her number."

"You're on." I agreed, extending my hand to close the deal. We shook on it and began to watch the waitress more closely, whispering our theories to each other.

"What are you two going on about?" John asked sliding our drinks toward us. He and the Doctor had been discussing Charles Dickens, but they were now both looking at us.

"We made a bet-" I started.

"-about who the waiter was interested on, and who's going to leave with her number." Sam finished.

"Can I take your orders?" The waitress inquired, cutting off our conversation. We all ordered, except for Sherlock. He declared that eating slowed his thinking, and he never ate while on a case. I think John counted it as a small miracle that Sherlock was even drinking tea, but the blogger ordered an extra side of toast for the detective anyway.

The waitress left our table to tend to one of the elderly couples in a corner booth. Dean, having nothing else to focus on, pulled out the paper with all the letters that had been carved into the palms of the victims. He still had the pencil I had given him earlier and started writing down ideas. I couldn't quite see what he was doing, but Sherlock was obviously interested. The detective was leaning forward, pointing to certain letters on the sheet.

"Doctor, you said you travel through time right?" Dean asked.

"And space," the Doctor added.

"In your experience, can there be someone travel through time through a natural phenomenon?"

"There can be holes that can cause that, if a person where to get caught in them." The Doctor answered thoughtfully.

"Would that person travel in chronological order?" Dean questioned. Sherlock was leaning closer to the Doctor and Dean, absorbing the conversation. The rest of us were still confused to where this conversation was going.

"It could happen, but it's unlikely."

"So if a serial killer were to fall into one of these time holes, but continue murdering people, the order that he would be murdering and the order that we see the murders appear in would be different."

"Theoretically, yes that's correct."

I had to admit that in his own way Dean was also a genius. I doubt that Sherlock could have made the same connection Dean had, because he never dealt with cases as illogical as this one was turning out to be.

"Meaning the unmarked bodies are spaces in between words. Brilliant." Sherlock smirked, pulling the piece of paper closer to him. The detective's eyes were darting back and forth between the remaining letters. His eyes suddenly stopped moving, and Sherlock relaxed into his seat, smirking at his genius.

"What did you figure out?" Dean asked leaning forward in anticipation of Sherlock's answer. Sherlock's face was steady. To the unknown eye he looked the same as usually, but John and I both saw there was a feeling of doom and sadness underlying the pale skin. He swallowed thickly, before reading the unscrambled anagram out loud.

"Lucy, stop running."


	4. Chapter 4: Sorry, it's too dangerous

Everything was silent for a moment. My heart didn't beat. My lungs didn't take in any air. My mouth refused to work, to proclaim the absurdity of the anagram, to tell Sherlock that he must have gotten it wrong. I sat in the corner of the booth unmoving and ready to explode with every emotion possible for a human to feel.

"Lucy?" Someone was touching my shoulder, but I couldn't tell who. Everything was much too numb. "Lucy!" The voice was more urgent this time. I wondered slowly who was trying to get me attention.

Someone started shaking my other shoulder, saying my name in harmony with the first person. Why were these two people trying to get my attention? Couldn't they see I was too far gone?

After what felt like an eternity my heart began to beat again, my lungs expanded to take in precious oxygen, and my mouth closed with resolve. Sam was looking my in the eyes worriedly. One of hands was on my shoulder; the other was on my face. I leaned into it unthinkingly. I couldn't help but be thankful for the comfort it gave. The Doctor's hand was on my other shoulder, not shaking it anymore. As I began to regain awareness, I noticed that everyone around the table was looking at me with concern.

My heart, stilled before, was now hammering in my chest. What did it mean? Why was the demon leaving me a message? Could it be referring to a different Lucy? I paused in my rapidly racing thoughts, to examine that last question. Logically, the message could be referring to anyone who shared my name on the planet. However, deep down in my bones, I knew the message was left for me.

The Doctor had removed his hand by now, and John had flagged down the closest waitress, asking for another cup of tea. Sam, however, continued to keep his hand on my face. While I appreciated the comfort, loved it really, I shook my head to clear the chaos inside it, making Sam withdraw his hands.

"That," I said after a moment, looking at Sherlock and Dean, "was absolutely brilliant."

"What?" Dean asked confused. Sherlock, however, responded with a gracious but curt, "Thank you."

The waitress brought over the cup of tea John had ordered. He thanked her and slid the tea across the table to me. I wrapped my hands around the white mug, letting them absorb the heat. It was soothing, and I began to relax again. After taking a sip, I saw Sherlock struggling to hold back a wave of questions.

"Go ahead Sherlock," I said, preparing for the onslaught.

"Do you know how you're tied into this?"

"Not any more than you do." That wasn't entirely true, but I really wasn't sure how I was tied into the murders. Until Sherlock had decoded the anagram, I hadn't known I was tied in at all.

"Did you witness the murder of Ally Johnson?"

"No."

"Have you been to the crime scene yet?"

"Not exactly," I replied, biting my bottom lip.

"Explain."

"Ally Johnson was killed in the house behind mine. There's a line of trees separating our yards, but I could see all the police lights as they came to investigate the scene from the front window."

"Who lives in that house?"

"No one, it's been empty for years."

"Do you know the person who lived there last?"

"It's been empty for as long as I can remember."

"We need to go there then." Sherlock went to get up, but John pulled his coat sleeve, making him sit back down.

"It's fine to go running off in the middle of a conversation when you're with me, but now we're working with four other people, all of whom are hungry. You're staying at this table until we've finished eating." There was no room for argument in John's statement. Sherlock gave in, sitting back down. John let go of Sherlock's sleeve, and I swore the detective looked disappointed.

"Here," I said, pulling my backpack out from under the table. "I told you, I'd give these back once we were in the diner."

I took out the folder with all the previous police reports and Sherlock's sparse notes. Handing the notes to him, I went back to sipping my tea. Sherlock wasn't content with having to stay in the diner, but he relented, leaning back into the booth's seat to examine facts he had overlooked before. John seemed grateful that he was actually going to get a meal.

"Are you okay?" The Doctor asked quietly.

"I think I'm doing pretty well, considering there's a demon on my tail." I laughed. Honestly, I was scared. It didn't matter that I could defend myself, if a demon was out to get me I was in trouble. For the first time, I acknowledged that I may actually need protecting.

The Doctor was going to ask me another question, but our food arrived before he could voice it. I turned my attention on the plate of Belgium waffles set in front of me. I wasn't really hungry anymore, the news had caused my stomach to twist into knots, but I had to eat to keep my strength for what I imagined would be long day.

"I think she's starting to take an interest in Dean," Sam said leaning forward. He gestured to the waitress with his head. I glanced up at her. The waitress was indeed paying more attention to Dean, but I noticed she fluttered her eyelashes at Sherlock.

"She's still hoping that Sherlock will pay attention to her. She keeps batting her eyelashes at him," I replied. He was absorbed in the files, oblivious to everything going on around him. Only one of his hands was holding the papers, though. I stretched my neck a fraction of an inch to see that Sherlock's other hand was resting on John's. I smiled to myself. The two of them were really incredibly adorable together. It was a shame that Castiel wasn't here. I'd love to see his interactions with Dean.

"You've got a point." Sam muttered.

"Do you think she's attractive?" I blurted out. I instantly regretted it, blushing furiously. I popped the collar on my jacket in an attempt to hide my cheeks.

"Yeah, she's pretty. Why?"

"Ahh.. I don't know the question just popped out," my heart dropped a little, but I couldn't pinpoint the reason. Changing the topic, I turned to John. "Thank you for the tea."

"Not a problem," he replied, before placing another piece of sausage in his mouth a bit awkwardly with his right hand. The corner of one of the slices of toast was missing, so I assumed, happily, that John had gotten Sherlock to eat at least a little.

I was finishing with my last bite when the waitress came around again to take our plates back to the kitchen. I realized that she was completely avoiding the Doctor's gaze and nodded jerkily when he spoke to her. I doubt Sam noticed it, because he began to taunt me about how I was only going to be leaving here with one sock. I told him to shut it.

Within the next few minutes everyone had finished their meals, and Sherlock had even eaten an entire slice of toast. The waitress came around once again to drop off the check. Everyone chipped in what they could, paying for each other's meals. In the end, Jennifer got quite a nice tip. Sherlock was up in a second, ready to rush off to the scene of the crime. The rest of us exited the booth at a more normal speed. As we were leaving I caught sight of Jennifer and walked over to her.

"Hey," I greeted. "I saw one you looking at one of my friends back there, but I couldn't tell which one…"

Jennifer's cheeks flushed pink, quickly looking over at the group of fictional characters milling by the door, waiting for me. "The tall one," I barely contained an eye roll, all of them were tall, except for John, "with the leather jacket."

"Dean?" I replied taken aback. I was certain she was making lovey-dovey eyes at the Doctor.

"Do you think he would be interested?" She asked biting her lower lip.

"Probably."

"Here let me just jot down my number for you." She pulled out her pad for orders, ripped out a page, and wrote her number down quickly. Still blushing she handed the piece of paper to me, "there you go. Thank you!"

"No problem." I took her number, holding it gingerly. Looks like Sam won the bet.

I pivoted on my heel and walked back to the door. Seeing I was on my way, they all started to file out the door. Sam fell behind, wanting to know the result.

"She was interested in Dean, and gave me her number to hand over to him." I handed Sam the paper without looking at it. I pushed open the door, saying "Looks like you won both bets. So do I give you both of my socks now?"

Sam, who had been reading the number, started laughing. "No. I don't think so." He held out the piece of paper for me to read. "It says here: _Sorry I didn't want to freak you out, but I'm not attracted to guys. Call me if you're interested!_"

"Looks like I didn't win the bet either." Sam said glancing down at me.

"Guess we're switching socks, then." I responded, giggling.

We looked around the sidewalk, jogging to the closest bench. The rest of the group was a fair amount ahead of us by now, but we'd catch up in a moment. Sitting down, I took off my left converse shoe and pulled off my sock. Sam did the same, but with his right foot. We exchanged socks, quickly putting them back on along with our shoes.

Sam was laughing like a five year-old, and I wasn't any better. We ran to catch up with everyone else, slowing to a walk as we approached them.

"Sammy what took you so long?" Dean asked his brother.

"I was waiting for Lucy." He shrugged.

The Doctor, who had been walking nearest to Dean, looked at the two of us on the verge of tears from laughing. "Who won the bet?"

"We both lost. Jennifer told Lucy that she was interested in Dean, but then gave her number to Lucy."

"So she wasn't attracted to me?" Dean asked, faking a hurt expression.

"Apparently she doesn't swing that way." I responded to Dean.

"Are you going to call her?" Sam asked, turning to me.

"Probably not," I replied looking down at the number. "She's not really my type."

"What's your type then?" Sam asked, curiously.

"Fictional." I responded immediately. It was a joke between me and a few of my friends in high school. I never dated or paid attention to boys or girls, preferring to bury my head in a book or watch another episode from the television shows I always talked about. However, the second that word came out of my mouth I realized how strange that sounded with the current company I was holding. To keep from any awkward questioning, I hastily switched the subject. Posing the question to no one in particular I asked, "What are we going to do when we get back to the crime scene?"

"Look at everything the idiots, who call themselves police men, missed." Sherlock responded in a clipped tone.

"They're not the brightest bunch are they?" Dean joined in, smirking.

"Turn left here," I directed Dean.

"I know where your house is Lucy, you don't need to direct me."

"I'm not directing you, just reminding you." I replied sitting back into my seat. It had been a tight squeeze, but the six of us had managed to fit into the Impala. Sherlock, John, and the Doctor were all sitting in the back. The three grown men had left little room for me, so I found myself sitting in the front seat of the car between Sam and Dean. Dean didn't seem particularly pleased with the seating arrangements, but the only other option was to put me in the truck, which Sam had objected to immediately. I wasn't very keen on it either, so I was put up front, trying to stay out of Dean's way as much as I could.

Dean turned left, where I had directed him. The Impala rolled into the cal-de-sac, stopping in front of the abandoned house. The house stood on its own with no neighbors close enough to see through the dusty windows. The grass had been trimmed recently. One of the neighbors had probably done it. It was the sort of neighborhood where everyone was judged by the height of their lawn and the smudges on their windows. A house like this, foreclosed and unlived in for years, stuck out like a sore thumb. Everyone tried to avoid it, until it grew into a problem. I had always enjoyed the house. I had snuck in through the back door, many a time to escape from the stress and depression my life at school often caused.

The first time I had gone in, I was fifteen. I thought I was old enough to make my own decisions, but my mother had disagreed. In an act of defiance, I had crept out of my bedroom window onto the roof. From there I had jumped onto the porch, which always sounded impressive when I retold the story. But in truth, the roof was only a few feet above one of the boxes on the deck. I had jumped onto that, hopped down onto the porch, and ran off it as fast as I could.

I was still mad at my mother, so I headed in the direction of the empty house. She had told me often not to go exploring there, saying it was too dangerous and I'd get hurt. What better way to get revenge on the woman? When I reached the house that first time, I found the back door unlocked once I had shimmied the knob a bit. I spent the next part of an hour inside the house, exploring the quiet rooms and dust covered furniture in the slanting evening sunlight. My mother's voice floated from our yard, calling for me. I had exited the house quickly and made myself look like I had been playing under the trees, as I sometimes did, by rolling around in a pile of pine needles and red-orange leaves. My mother had reprimanded me for getting so dirty, but she never found out where I had truly gone.

From that point on the house had been a place of retreat for me. I'd go there whenever I felt I couldn't handle my life anymore. As the years went on I would bring books and then my laptop. I read the beginning and the ending to Harry Potter in the rooms of that house. I had become a Superwholockian in that house. I had joined tumblr and spent many hours scrolling down its dashboard in that house.

Now my beloved escape was the scene of a murder. I feared that I would never feel at peace there again. Dean parked the car and shut off the engine, surrounding us in silence. He opened his door and emerged onto the street bathed in the afternoon light. Sherlock followed him quickly, opening his own door and climbing out of the car. The others got out in the back, but Sam didn't move. He was looking at Dean his face torn between guilt and agreement.

Dean ducked his face to look down at us, still sitting in the front. He blocked my path one way and Sam blocked it the other way. Why wouldn't they let me out?

"Lucy. The demon or whatever is in that house is hunting you. We can't let you go in." Dean said sternly, allowing no room for argument. "You need to stay safe until we know what's going on."

"Bullshit." I exclaimed, sliding over to the driver's seat of the car. I figured it would be easier to get past Dean than Sam from the sitting position I was currently in.

"He's got a point, Lucy." The Doctor agreed while he fiddled with his sonic screwdriver. "If the demon is after you, we should keep you away from the crime scene. I've lost too many companions doing reckless things like this."

"Plus, we need to get some research done. You and Sam can work on that while we investigate the house." Dean said, finishing up his argument.

"How am I supposed to investigate without any data or crime scene information?" I nearly screamed.

"Sammy always does a good job of it. He could teach you a few tricks." Dean shrugged.

John and Sherlock hadn't butted into the conversation yet. John's eyes kept flickering between Dean and me, trying to figure out which side to take. In the end, he looked up at Sherlock and decided to keep his opinion to himself. Sherlock seemed to think differently, "She'd be absolutely fine. Chances are she knows the place more than you do."

I have no idea how, but Sherlock had deduced that I had been here before. Dean, however, had no idea of my previous wanderings. "I doubt that Sherlock. I'm not going to argue any longer. Lucy isn't going and Sam is going to watch over her."

"I don't need to be protected Dean!" He ignored me, shutting the Impala's door in my face. The hunter gathered his bag of weapons from the truck. The car shook slightly as he slammed the hood. He continued without saying another word toward the house.

The rest of the group looked at my guiltily before following. Sherlock, who had been scribbling on to a page for the majority of argument, opened the driver's door to the Impala and handed me back the case files with his notes written in red ink. "I suggest you use these to conduct your research."

He shut the door quickly and, popping his coat collar up, strolled into the house after the others. His eyes were already darting around snatching at pieces of information normal minds missed and storing all the important bits in his mind palace.

"If I tried to make a run for the house right now what would you do?"

"I'd have to stop you," Sam admitted. "I'm sorry, Lucy. It's just too dangerous for you to go into that house. Hell, I think it's risky even having you outside the place."

I huffed in response. I didn't expect a different answer, but I had hoped that Sam would be on my side.

"Scoot over. You can have my seat, and I'll drive the car to your home."

"Whatever." I mumbled cradling the case notes to my chest. Sam looked dejected by my lack of enthusiasm, but I could hardly care. The most interesting adventure to happen in my life was going on, and I was missing out on it.


	5. Chapter 5: Research

Sam pulled the Impala into the driveway of my house. He sat in the car for a moment, silent and still.

"I'm sorry, Lucy." He said, breaking his quiet tension. I looked at him, taken aback. I hadn't expected an apology from either of the hunters.

"It's… fine." I sighed. "I can see the reasoning behind keeping me away from the crime scene. I just don't like it." Sam nodded, but didn't say anything. His head sagged a little bit, and he was fiddling guiltily with the buttons on his coat.

"Well! Sitting in silence is always fun, but let's get down to work. Shall we?" I declared sarcastically, hoping lighten the mood. I opened the car door, still clutching at the case files Sherlock had handed to me.

"Right, that sounds like a good idea." Sam emerged from his side of the car. His limbs seemed to stretch out for a mile, making it hard to believe they had fit in the car.

I felt for the house key in my pocket, but I couldn't find it. I patted my other pockets to no avail. In the excitement from this morning I must have forgotten to bring it. "Uhh... Sam could you unlock the door, please?"

"Sure, where's the key?" My face flushed a light pink color.

"I don't have it."

"Oh," Sam laughed in understanding. He bent down in front of the lock, and set to work on it. Less than a minute later he had undone both locks on the door. He twisted the knob and held the door open for me. "After you my lady."

I laughed, entering the house. Sam came in behind me with his eyes alight in happiness. It nearly broke my heart to see how much happier of a person Sam had been before Azazel told him about the demon blood, destroying his self-worth and making him feel like a freak.

I walked into the kitchen, sliding the case files into my back pack to free my hands. "Do you want anything to drink Sammy?"

"Water would be fine."

"Some H20 coming right up." I grabbed two glasses from the nearest cabinet, filled them up, and handed one to Sam. I stalked over to the countertop where the pie was sitting from this morning. Placing two forks into the nearly empty dish, I balanced it in my other hand.

"Let's go, Sammy." I heard him follow me as I went up the stairs for the second time today. Leading him into my bedroom, I placed the pie tin and my water down on the desk, which had been shoved into the corner. I removed my shoes, and carefully set them beneath the window.

"We'll probably be here for a while, Sam. You might as well take of your shoes too."

"Oh, yea… Sure thing," He set his glass next to mine and removed his shoes placing them by the doorway. "Why did you take the pie? We just ate."

"It's a subtle way of telling Dean I'm pissed at him." I responded, sliding my backpack onto my bed.

"You know he'll be upset." Sam looked at the pie as if it was in the act of betraying his brother.

"That's the point." I replied with as much sass as I could muster. Sam looked a bit taken aback by my response, so I added in, "There's another pie downstairs. Dean just won't know that."

"Why do you have two pies?" Sam asked, amused.

"I bake when I'm bored." I replied, defensively. Turning my attention back to my bag, I rifled through its contents taking out the mythology book and the case files.

The pages were much more marked up than they had been before. I had a feeling it was for my benefit. Sherlock must have anticipated that Dean was going to keep me from going onto the crime scene, so he wrote down some of the key points in the hopes I would figure them out. I'm not exactly sure why Sherlock seemed to think so highly of me. I was really just like anyone else. Ordinary. Boring. Yet he had seemed to respect me ever since I ran into them on the street. Perhaps, he had liked the flattery I had offered, or maybe he saw some intelligence in me that I didn't know existed.

I desperately wanted to start reading through the papers, but the room had to be demon proofed a bite further first. Setting the pages aside, I gestured toward the windows, "Would you mind moving those jars to the side, so we can secure the windows?"

"Of course," Sam approached the windows and began to set the jars on the hardwood floor. I walked over to my closet and took out a large box of salt. I poured it by and around the door. By now Sam had taken all of the jars, so I threw him the container of salt. He caught it with an easy grace, pouring it along the closed windows. Truth be told, I hated having the windows closed. It made me feel trapped. I understood the need to keep them shut for further protection, though, so I kept my mouth shut.

Taking the pie tin and my water, I settled back onto my bed, citing cross-legged. Sam finished pouring the salt, and he set the container down next to the jars. Sam grabbed the remaining glass of water and took a sip, causing the ice to clink. Unsure of where to sit, he leaned up against the wall awkwardly. Sam really was a cutie, I thought glancing over at him. The silly boy didn't know what to do with himself half the time.

"Come over here. I know you want to look at the files as much as I do," I invited, patting the bed next to me. I scooted over a few inches to make room for the large hunter, and he sat down beside me, crossing his legs. I set the pie tin between us and the papers in front of us.

"Let's get started, shall we?" Beyond the sound of ruffling paper and the scrape of a fork along the bottom of the pie pan, we were enveloped in silence. I was looking through Sherlock's autopsy report when I found something strange. He had noted there were high levels of Cu3Zn2 in the tissue of the wound, but not in other parts of the body. Freeing the laptop from my bag, I searched Cu3Zn2. The results that popped up showed that Cu3Zn2 was the chemical formula for brass. I sat back a little, looking at Sherlock's notes again.

"So get this," I said breaking the relative quiet of our research time. Sam looked up surprised from the file he had been reading. I pointed to the autopsy report, "Sherlock noted here that there was a high concentration of Cu3Zn2, which is brass. That means the murder weapon had to be made from brass. That's not really the typical way that demons kill."

Sam leaned closer to me to look at the paper. "You're right. Something isn't right about this."

"I don't think the demon is working alone. It must have someone or something else working with it." I chewed on my bottom lip, nervously. Imagine dealing not only with a demon, but also with some other type of monster. "Have you seen anything in the other reports?"

"Umm," Sam riffled through the pages he had been reading. "A couple of these reports mentioned feathers at the scene. The weird thing was that they said the feathers were made out of metal."

"Oh, that could be it." I quickly grabbed Sam's phone (it was the closest) and dialed John's number. The phone rang twice before John picked it up.

"Hello?"

"Hi John, it's Lucy."

"Is everything alright?" I could hear him getting nervous for my well being, settling into solider mode.

"Yes. Everything is fine. I just had a question."

"Okay," the relief in his voice was well hidden. "What is it?"

"Have any of you found a feather? A metal one, it would probably be brass?"

"No I… give me a second," his hand covered the receiver as he called for Sherlock. I heard him ask the detective if he had seen a brass feather. The detective was silent for a moment, and I could only imagine him whirling around the room his black coat swirling around him, looking for a feather. A slight "Aha!" reached my ears from the covered receiver, and I looked at Sam nervously. We were both on edge, waiting for a response.

"Yes there is indeed a brass feather on the scene of the crime," Sherlock said into the phone. Apparently he had taken it from John. "Do you think it's connected to the Cu3Zn2 I found in the body?"

"That's exactly what we think, Sherlock." I replied to the detective, excitement rising in my chest.

"I suggest you search for some _creature _with brass feathers, maybe a bird or something similar." There was a bit of scuffling on their end of the line, before John spoke again. "I don't think Sherlock likes admitting that he doesn't know a thing about the supernatural or any sort of mythology. He would have deleted it all ages ago. I think he managed to answer your question, though."

"Yes he did. Thank you very much Doctor Watson." I clicked the end call button and handed the phone back to Sam. He grinned at me, taking it from my hand and slipping it into his pocket.

"So we're looking for something with metal wings?" Sam asked, scooping my laptop up to put on his lap.

"More than just metal wings," I thought out loud. "Remember the wound? I think it could be from a beak. We're probably looking for something that's either a bird or half bird. Judging by the missing heart, it probably has a taste for human flesh."

"Wonderful, a flesh-eating bird and a demon are both chasing after you."

"Basically," I nodded with a smirk. "It looks like my life is finally getting interesting."

Sam gave me a look that landed somewhere between concerned and smitten. I smiled in response. I found it increasingly harder to ignore that I seemed just as besotted with Sam as he seemed to be with me. Snatching my mythology book, which Sam had been looking through a bit earlier, I began to skim the pages for the monster. After a few minutes here, Sam turned the laptop screen to face me.

"Stymphalian Birds, they fit the criteria perfectly. They have brass wings. They're sometimes depicted with a beak. They also have a penchant for human flesh."

I studied the article Sam had pulled up. "They're from Greek Mythology, one of Hercules's tasks. How do we defend against it?" I asked turning to face Sam.

"Says here that Hercules used a brass castanet, the clashing noise drove the birds crazy. Then he shot them down with a bow and arrow."

"Do you know how to shoot a bow and arrow?"

"Actually, I can." He responded, smiling.

"Really? I shouldn't be surprised by that, but your Dad taught you to shoot a bow and arrow?"

"He taught us just in case, but I've never used one on a gig. We don't have one in the truck either, just the guns."

"What about other weapons? Bo-staff? Nun-chucks?"

"We can use basically anything as a weapon."

"Nice," I said impressed. "Back on topic, we need something that will make loud noises. Gunshots are a bit conspicuous, maybe some cymbals or…. Oh!"

"What?" Sam asked surprised by my sudden outburst.

"I'll be right back." I rushed out of the room, running down the stairs. I turned an immediate right into a room my parents liked to refer to as the music room. There was a piano and a few guitars in there, along with my violin and miscellaneous instruments we've acquired over the years.

"LUCY! You aren't supposed to leave the room!" I could hear Sam chasing after me down the stairs his feet falling heavily on the steps. I found a box over in the corner of the room that contained most of the random instruments from my years as a child. I pulled a tambourine out of the box. Sam can into the room at that moment and upon seeing the tambourine began to laugh.

"That's what you rushed down here for?"

"Oh stop it. You know this is the noisiest thing I have in the house. I think it will do its job well." I stomped past him, picking up my violin case on the way. I marched back up the stairs with the hunter following behind still laughing. I set the tambourine within reach of the where I was sitting on my bed. When Sam entered the room behind me, he found me staring down at my violin case debating to open it or not.

"Why did you bring that up here?"

"I play when I'm nervous. It helps soothe my nerves." I answered honestly.

"Then why aren't you playing?" Sam asked sitting down next to me.

"I don't like having an audience. It's too easy to make one mistake, making everyone think you're terrible." I traced the clasps on the case. Should I play in front of Sam? I didn't really want to, but the comfort the notes would bring would soothe my chaotic thoughts.

"Will you play?" Sam looked at me hopefully. God, it was hard to see him hopeful. I desperately wanted to hug him tightly, keep him from protected from all the harm that comes his way.

"Okay," I replied in a small voice. Who was I to deny him anything? I flipped the silver clasps open with a faint click and pushed back the top of the case, revealing the violin inside it. It really was a beautiful instrument. Its wooden body shined as I tenderly picked it up, setting it on my lap. Next I took the bow out of the case, sliding the rosin along the strings. I closed the case and set it at the side of my bed.

"Just don't… judge me too much okay?"

"Of course not," Sam replied earnestly.

Taking a deep breath, I set the bow to the strings. I had been working on a piece called "A Thousand Years" by Christina Perri. A lot of people recognized it from one of the Twilight movies. However, I had come across it while watching Johnlock fan videos. There was one based off an excellently written, but incredibly sad pieced called "Alone on the Water." I watched the video and cried for good hour afterward, repeating the video over and over. It was an addicting sort of sorrow.

The piece was memorized, and I had played it so many times I could probably do it in my sleep. I closed my eyes, letting the first note ring out. I let my fear dissipate in the wake of the pure notes that rung out from my instrument. I thought back to all my beloved characters and how they were here now, sharing the day with me, so I poured my happiness into the music. I thought how Sam, John, Sherlock, they were all going to leave me once this case was solved. I would be all alone again. I thought how being alone was fine, until you got a taste of what it felt like to be with others. Then being alone no longer held its appeal. I let that sadness I knew was coming ripple into the sweet sound of the song.

The song was only a few minutes long, but it felt like an eternity. By the time my bow played the last note, I was too far gone to return to reality. I took a moment before opening my eyes, realizing they were wet. At some point in the song, I had begun to cry. I didn't remember crying.

I lowered the violin and used the hand with the bow to wipe my eyes. I felt a hand on my shoulder and traced it up to the owner's face.

"Lucy, that was… stunning. I've never- I've never heard something so beautiful in my life."

"You really think so?"

"Absolutely," he replied, wiping away the remaining tears on my face away with his thumb. I looked up, our eyes meeting. Sam leaned in brushing his lips against mine gently. I melted into the kiss, his lips much softer than I would have imagined. After a moment, we mutually pulled away. I smiled cautiously at the hunter, and he grinned back, pulling me into a hug.

Three knocks on the door, abruptly pulled us out of the embrace. Dean's voiced carried through the mostly opened doorway, "Is it safe to come in now, or do you girls need a few more minutes Sammy?"

The horror stricken look on Sam's face made me laugh. I scouted back a bit, returning my violin to its place in my lap before calling out "Come on in Dean. We were just waiting for you."


	6. Chapter 6: Case Breakdown

Dean walked in throwing a wink in his brother's direction, which was only to be expected. My cheeks flushed a bit in embarrassment, but I was too happy to care that Dean had seen them kissing from the staircase. Honestly, I was a bit appalled that I hadn't heard them coming in. Apparently, Sam had distracted me a lot more than I had thought. Following him into my bedroom were the three others that had gone to examine the crime scene. I had to admit that the presence of five grown albeit fictional men in my bedroom was very strange. But who was I to argue?

"So Sammy what did you find?" Dean asked.

"A Stymphalian Bird, it explains the brass feathers and several aspects of the wounds inflicted on the victims. The demon is probably using one to do its dirty work." Sam explained, looking through our notes.

"What the hell? Why's a demon working with a Stymphalian Bird?" Dean looked a bit like Sherlock for a moment, racking his brain to figure out the problem in front of him. I forgot sometimes that Dean was really a combination of brains and brawn.

"I don't know man. Demons don't usually pair up with another creature. Maybe this one just has a fondness for birds." Sam replied with a shrug.

"Did you guys find anything?" I asked.

"Definite traces of demonic presence. The place was coated in sulfur," Dean replied. He spotted the pie tin sitting between Sam and me, and leaned forward hopefully only to find it was empty. He scowled at us as he went to sit down at the desk.

"Sounds like we must be on the right track, how about the findings from your end, Doctor?" I asked.

"I picked up some traces of a time holes," the Doctor responded waving his screwdriver. "It seemed to be naturally occurring, so we aren't looking at a time traveler. My guess is that this demon fell into the hole by accident, and for some reason it blames you." I nodded. I'm sure the demon had excellent motivation to blame me.

"It's definitely a hole or tear, not a crack?" I affirmed.

"Would I be able to tell if it was a crack?"

"There would be a crack in the wall or the ceiling. You probably would have noticed it."

"I didn't see any cracks… Why is it important?" The Doctor stared me down, but I held my ground.

"Sorry I can't tell you. Spoilers," The time lord nodded.

"It's best not to mess with my time line." He agreed.

"Did you check for any void particles?" I asked the Doctor.

"No... I didn't think of that. Oh nice job, you're brilliant, you are." As he felt around in his pockets for what looked like old school 3D glasses with one lens blue and the other red, I glanced around the room. Sam and Dean were exchanging a series of silent comments via eye telepathy. They stopped as soon as they noticed me looking, but I'm certain they started up again when I turned away. John and Sherlock were both leaning up the wall near the doorway listening to our conversation in interest. Well John looked interested. Sherlock looked like he wanted to interrupt us and spill out all of his findings. John seemed to be holding him back somehow. God bless the day that man had met Sherlock. I don't think anyone else could ever get Sherlock to keep from bursting out his thoughts. I noticed Sherlock was pinching John's jacket between his thumb and index finger to control himself. I found the gesture to be kind of sweet and grinned to myself.

"Here they are." The Doctor said finally pulling the glasses out of an inside pocket of his suit jacket.

"Could I try them on?!" I could barely contain my excitement.

"Of course," he said with a smile, handing me the glasses. I slid them on. Expecting to only see void debris on the Doctor I was surprised to see it on everyone else too. I looked down at my own hand. It was fine. No traces of the void on my skin, but everyone else seemed to have passed through it at some point. I told this to the Doctor.

"Weeell, I guess the time hole could have created thinner boundaries between our realities and yours that allowed us to pass through."

"Wait so we are actually from the television shows like Lucy said?" John interjected.

"As far as I can tell, yes, we're all from different realities. We shouldn't be here. We don't exist here outside of the shows." The Doctor answered, facing John.

"Will we be able to go back?"

"I'm not even sure how we got into this reality in the first place. That alone shouldn't be possible." The Doctor answered, running a hand threw his hair.

I thought about the few times in the show when any of the characters had crossed the void. Peter Tyler and his universe's version of Torchwood had made those buttons that allowed them to jump through. The Doctor's TARDIS had made it through the void and back once as well, but that trip had nearly wrecked her. By all means that I could think of, none of these people (characters? I had no idea what to call them now) should have arrived in my small town of Doubery.

"But is it possible, even just a little bit, for you all to get back?" I asked the Doctor.

"It's possible, but I don't think it's likely." The Doctor responded. I was torn. On one hand, the characters I had looked up to for so long were now stuck in my universe, and I could talk to them as much as I desired. I even had some sort of relationship blooming with Sam, which I couldn't be more excited about. On the other hand, it was unfair to separate these characters away from their families and friends. I wished that I could do something. Instead of dwelling on my inability to help, I swiveled to face Sherlock and John. Might as well continue gathering facts on the case, we could always work on trying to travel back across the void later.

"I'm sure you've been dying to inform us about how idiotic we are, so why not tell us what you found Sherlock?" I asked teasingly. I knew Sherlock was dying to inform us of everything that we'd missed.

Sherlock straightened up and began to pace in the middle of the room. "While I don't have the same knowledge about time and space or the supernatural, do shut your mouth John I'm not being modest, I do have a superior comprehension of crime scenes than the rest of you. If any of you had bothered to notice, the house was more or less cleaned of dust. It's been abandoned for years. There should have been layers of dust coating everything, but there wasn't. This held true throughout the entire house, so I don't believe you could blame it on the demon or the time hole, meaning that there has been someone going in and out of that house recently."

I grimaced. I wasn't going to mention that I had been a visitor to the house for fear that everyone would reprimand me, because it was 'too dangerous.' Sherlock must have caught me mid grimace, because he gave me a quizzical look. I shook my head slightly, and he breathed a small 'oh' when he caught the understanding. I knew he'd interrogate me about my presence in the house later, but for now I remained quiet and let the detective continue his deductions.

"In addition there were several sets of footprints leading to and from the front door. Unfortunately the police did a right job trampling over most of those. However, there was clearly one set of footprints that lead only into the house. Those belonged to Ally Johnson, because she never walked back out the door. There was also another set of size 11 men's shoes that _only _exit from the house."

"How could someone only leave the house?" Dean asked, cautiously. It seemed like he already knew the answer and was praying that he was wrong. It slowly began to dawn on me as well, what Sherlock had just said.

"If what you all said was true, the demon entered the house not by the front door, but by a time hole. Then the only explanation is that he didn't return to the time hole, and he left the house after the murder."

"Shit." I heard Sam swear under his breath. I couldn't agree more.

A knock on the door broke our current argument over what to do about my well being. As I had stated before, I didn't care that much about my own well-being. I just wanted to have an adventure. I wanted to do something interesting with my life, and if I died as a result than at least I died living the way I had always dreamt I would. Unfortunately, I was the only one who saw things this way. Sherlock, while not exactly on my side, had been defending my abilities and repeatedly state that everyone was underestimating me.

"I'll go get that," I said rising to my feet. Well I would check to see who it was first from the top window. It wasn't like I was going to open the door to a stranger.

"You can't do that. The demon is on the loose!" Sam nearly yelled.

"Oh, so you're going to answer the door at _my _house? I'm sure that would go over really well. I'm sure my neighbors wouldn't find having five guys in my house strange at all. Especially when they all know that I don't have any friends nowadays." I saw John's face fall from the corner of my eye. It was true though. Ever since I had started college, I had lost contact with all my high school friends. I lived at home during the school year, as well, so my relationships with peers in my classes didn't really go that far. I was a quiet person, and I liked it that way.

"You can't leave this room. It isn't safe," Sam tried to convince me.

"I'll be fine." I replied, grabbing a water gun filled with holy water from my closet. "It'll only be a minute." With that I walked out my room toward the window in the guest room. I looked out at my front doorstep. Standing there was one of my neighbors. He lived sort of behind me, next to the abandoned house. He was a nice man, and we had talked on many occasions. He had even come to my high school graduation party. I smiled and turned to walk down the staircase only to find Sam standing in my way.

"If you won't stay in your room then I'm going downstairs with you. There's a car in your driveway, which I'm sure he noticed. My presence would explain that."

"Fine," I gave in. "You can come along. The rest of you," I said. Spinning toward my bedroom, I saw all their faces all lined up trying to take a peek at the goings on, "need to stay in there, and not let my neighbor see or hear you. Got it?"

"That's reasonable enough," John answered for the group. I don't think everyone agreed with him (actually they all looked ready to run him down), but the look he was giving them could melt internal organs. Needless to say, no one protested.

I ran down the stairs, checking the salt line as I reached for the door knob.

"Hi, Mr. Eddie!" I greeted upon opening the door.

"Good afternoon Lucy, it's nice to see you." He smiled back, extending his hand to shake mine. Sam gave me a warning look, but I took Mr. Eddie's hand, and nothing spectacular happened. He spotted Sam standing behind me, "Who's this lad?"

"Oh! This is Sam. Sam this is Mr. Eddie. He lives next to the house that murder happened in." I introduced the hunter, striving for a normal conversation.

"It's nice to meet you Sam." They shook hands. "Is that your car in the driveway?"

"It's my brother's actually." Sam responded loosing up a bit.

"Well, you should tell him that it's in beautiful condition. He must take fantastic care of it."

"He does. He loves that car more than he loves himself." Sam laughed. He had such a joyful laugh. I decided right then that my mission was to make him laugh a bit each day, so he never forgot how.

"You know how I love to see your exquisite face," I joked with my neighbor, "but did you have a reason for coming over?"

"Oh yeah, I was wondering if you knew anything about the murder."

"A bit," I answered cautiously.

"I heard," he said, lowering his tone to a hoarse whisper, "that you were the one who found the body. Now I wouldn't normally believe the neighborhood gossip, but I know how you like to frequent that house."

I felt my heart plummet. I knew everyone upstairs was listening and Sam's face was contorted into a horrified look. Sherlock had already figured out my secret, but I hadn't wanted anyone else to know. I didn't want to seem like I was engrained into the case as I was. Taking a shallow breath, I answered the question. Keeping secrets would never help with the investigation, and it would only make me look guilty of something.

"Yeah, I was heading down there to read a little bit, because the house felt too stuffy. I walked in the backdoor like I normally do, and I greeted by the lovely sight of the dead body. I didn't see the killer, if you were going to ask. I just saw the body. I called the police and told them." I forced a smile, almost able to feel the betrayed and surprised stares my comrades were burning into my back.

"Well blow me down, the rumors were true?"

"I guess they were," I shrugged, laughing. This really wasn't the appropriate time to be laughing, but I couldn't help it.

"I suppose that means your hiding spot is out of commission." Mr. Eddie joked.

"I know," I replied remorsefully. "I really liked it there."

"It's okay, sweetie. You'll find other places to go. You've always been an explorer like that." Mr. Eddie added, trying to cheer me up.

"Thanks." I said gratefully.

"I'll see you later, Lucy. Sam, it was nice to meet you. Be good to her. She's the most interesting person you'll ever meet. Just wait until she starts talking about all those shows she watches. You'll never meet a more passionate person." He turned his back to us and walked back down the brick pathway.

I closed the door behind him, inwardly kicking myself for telling everyone that information. Attempting to keep the attention off of me, I started to talk about Mr. Eddie. "I don't know why he said I was interesting. He's far more intriguing than I could ever be. He holds a world record for hosting the largest hide-and-seek game ever. The way it worked was that the contestants had to hide somewhere, have someone else take a picture of the room where they were hiding, and then mail the picture to his house. The people who had the most creative hiding spots won a prize. I got to help him sort through all the pictures. It was a ton of fun." I laughed at the memory. "Also he went to a neighborhood party dressed in drag and got propositioned by eleven different wedded men, and nineteen teen-aged boys. He's a falconer as well, which is just epic-"

"Lucy," Sam interrupted, placing his hands on my shoulders. "Did you really find the Ally's body?"

I sighed. Apparently, my attempt of distracting Sam hadn't worked. "Right, I don't want to say this all twice. Let's go upstairs."

The room was silent when I walked in. Everyone's eyes were on me as I approached my bed and took my seat once more. I set the squirt gun down on the floor and set the violin in my lap once more. Plucking at the lowest string on the instrument, I raised my eyes to meet the gazes coming my way. I felt Sam settle down next to me before I began to talk.

"Yes. I found the body. That house has been a sort of hideout for me since high school. I go there a few times every week to read or watch shows or movies on my laptop. It's a nice respite from the rest of my life."

"That was why nothing was dusty in the house?" John asked quietly to Sherlock. The detective and I both nodded.

"I have mild dust allergies. Once I started to go to the house frequently, I dusted the floors and some of the furniture."

"Describe how you found the body." Sherlock demanded.

"It was maybe four or five in the morning," I started trying to remember the scene.

"Four or five in the morning?" Dean looked at me like I was crazy. I probably was a little bit insane, now that I thought about it.

"Yeah, I don't like sleeping. It's a bit boring. I only do it, because my body demands me too." I heard Sherlock chuckle slightly. "Sometimes I wake up at four or five and I can't go back to sleep, so I go over to the house. It's quiet. Plus you won't be able to find a nicer place to watch the sunrise."

Gathering my thoughts I launched into the story of that morning. "Like I said, it was four or five in the morning. The sun wasn't up get, but the stars had already faded from the sky. The sky was light enough that I didn't need a flashlight to find my way to there. It was a little chilly that morning, because I remember the wind going through my thin pajama pants. Anyway, I entered the house through the backdoor like usual. It wasn't super light in the house, so I didn't realize anything was off at first. I mean you guys have seen the house, so you know that the backdoor leads to the kitchen, which is adjacent to the living room. I was going into the living room that was only just beginning to brighten up with the rising sun. I saw something lying on the middle of the floor. At first I thought it was an animal or even a blanket I had accidently left. The closer I got to the dark shape in the middle of the room, the more I realized that something was really really wrong. After a few more moment I realized it was a dead body, surrounded in a pool of blood. It wasn't quite the sight I had been looking for to start a peaceful morning. Needless to say, I called the police right away."

"Your name was never in the report," Sherlock pointed out.

"It wouldn't have been. I hung up before they could ask my name. A trick I had learned from you actually," I said turning to Dean. He nodded his approval.

"Why didn't you give them your name?" John asked.

"I didn't want to explain what I was doing the house. That could lead to questions I didn't have very good answers for."

"Makes enough sense to me," Dean said.

The Doctor was about to ask me another question when another knock on the door interrupted us.

"Here let me check instead," Sam insisted, putting a hand on my shoulder to keep me in place. The room went absolutely silent, waiting for Sam to announce who was standing at the door.

"It's Mr. Eddie," Sam stated, sticking his head through the open doorway.

"He does this sometimes," I started, getting up. "He denies that he's getting old, but every once in a while he'll forget that he just came over. This will just take a second." I said, addressing everyone else.

"Take the water gun just in case," John prompted, handing it to me.

"Thanks," I replied. Holding the water gun, I ran down the stairs after Sam.

Upon opening the door, I knew something felt off. Mr. Eddie's shirt had been purple when I talked to him a few minutes ago, now he was wearing a slightly obnoxiously colored orange shirt. His hair looked more disheveled than it had been earlier. I looked up at Sam to see if he noticed anything different. The hunter's brows were furrowed in concentration, trying to figure out what was wrong.

"Good afternoon, Mr. Eddie. To what do I owe the pleasure?" I greeted.

"No particular reason. I'm just stopping by to say hi." He extended his hand in greeting.

"Sorry," I said avoiding the handshake. "I'm not feeling my best today. I don't want to get you sick."

"How sweet of you Lucy, protecting an old man like me," he said genuinely. No, that wasn't right. He always _always_ used the term 'old man' sarcastically.

That's when I noticed something glittering in my peripheral vision. I raised my eyes to the roof of the house across the street. It was only a bird was sitting on a roof. There wasn't anything unusual about that. The bird shifted, however, causing the sun to bounce off its shinning feathers. My eyes widened in fear. Looking down at my neighbor's left hand, I saw that he was wearing his falconer glove.

"Oh good, you've figured it out," Mr. Eddie said his voice changing from its usual bumpy tone to something resembling black silk. My dear neighbor blinked slowly, and I knew exactly what was about to happen. My feet, however, refused to move. When he opened his eyes again, the warm brown irises were gone, replaced by completely by the black eyes of a demon. "I've just been _dying_ to see you again, Lucy."


	7. Chapter 7: Demon Attack

Seeing a demon on television is one thing. Preparing for a demon attack is another. However, standing close enough to a demon to feel the heat of its breath on my forehead is a different thing entirely. I was frozen numb in terror, unable to look away from the black eyes. I knew I needed to do something. Squirt it with the holy water in the gun; recite the exorcism; hell, even just run away from the monster. I couldn't do any of those things. My feet were rooted to the spot in surprise and disbelief. Why I couldn't believe what was in front of my eyes, I have no idea. I suppose it was just more terrifying than I could have ever put into words.

Thankfully, I wasn't alone. By the time my mind had rebooted itself and I started to move again, Sam had already sprung into action. He had taken the water gun from my hand and was shooting its contents at the demon. It was hissing and I could see the water burning its skin each time it made contact.

"Go! Go! Get back up stairs!" He yelled. I stumbled over my feet as he was pushing me toward the staircase.

"Get her!" Dean directed someone behind him. He continued racing down the stairs the colt in his hand.

"Don't shoot him! He's my neighbor. He's a good man!" I shouted at Dean. He nodded, but I think he only cared about the demon, not its meat suit. Dean pushed me up the stairs toward John. The soldier grabbed my arm, leading me firmly back toward my bedroom. We hadn't thought to protect the whole house I realized. The only safe room was my bedroom. Everything else was-

My thoughts were interrupted by the sound of glass shattering. I turned my head, nearly at the top of the stairs, to see what had happened. I instantly wished I hadn't. The windows all the windows within a nine foot radius of the front door had been shattered. The demon wearing Mr. Eddie was walking through the closest one, laughing at the sight of the two hunters. Both of them were bleeding from cuts by the glass. Sam was still standing. He had managed to raise his arms in time to shield his face from the shards. Dean hadn't been so lucky. He had been facing the windows when they exploded, and his face now had a smattering of cuts, all of which were bleeding.

They were both still fighting, but Dean was losing a lot of blood. I don't know how much longer he could fight before he passed out.

"You're an army doctor, John," I insisted. "Go help them. I'm fine."

"Sorry Lucy. You're the priority right now. As soon as you're safe, I'll help in the fight. Now come on." He tugged at my arm, urging me forward.

Suddenly, I felt a strong force push against my stomach that could only be from the demon, propelling through the staircase railings and onto the wall next to the landing and knocking the breath out of me. I struggled for a moment to fill my lungs with air again, before taking in the scene around me. Sam was pinned against a wall as well, and Dean was pale behind the bleeding cuts covering his face. John had been knocked aside by the momentum I had when the demon pushed me against the wall. However, the demon didn't seem to be paying attention to John as the solider quietly maneuvered around the debris of the hand railing. He was making his way toward me. Probably to help get me down, but I knew it wouldn't work. I tried to shake my head. However, John wasn't deterred in the slightest. In fact, he seemed ever more determined to reach me.

This of course attracted the attention of the demon, who then threw John against another wall. Just great. I hoped the Doctor and Sherlock had better ideas. I was suddenly aware of their absence. Where were they? Both of them were men of action. They should have been out in the fray the moment something seemed wrong. I glanced around for them, spotting Sherlock frantically going rifling through the notebooks in my bedroom. Looking for… looking for what? I turned my attention back to the demon. Maybe I could exorcise it while Dean and Sam were distracting it?

"Exorcizamus te, omnis immundus spiritus" I murmured. Barely moving my lips. Damn, if only I had the recording on me, but it was sitting in my room being entirely unhelpful. "omnis satanic potestas…"

My mouth felt like it had been suddenly been stuffed with cotton balls and duct taped shut as I went to say the next line.

"Oh that was cute." The demon said. He was striding up the stairs. Having control over the four of us, he was beginning to get cocky. "You tried to exorcise me. Too bad you lost your voice, sweetheart." His voice dripped like maple syrup. I glared at the bastard. How dare he patronize me.

"I've been waiting to see you for _years _now." Oh good, time for the demonic monologue. I always enjoyed those. "I was just trying to have some fun. I heard there had been a murder in the town, and I wanted to play into the hysteria. Have people in the town claiming to be possessed, maybe kill a few other people. It would have been fun, but _nooo_ you had to stop me. Well too bad for you, but I'm patient. You pushed me into that…" he stopped a moment trying to find a word. "mysterious hole, and I've been traveling, murdering one person each place I stopped. Then I would jump back into the hole, and make my way to you." He was walking with his hands behind his back, obviously glowing in his success at catching me. I still had no idea what I had done to the demon, but I didn't bother voicing that knowledge. It wouldn't have mattered to the demon much anyway.

"You know, it got easier over time. I could focus on a year when I jumped into the hole. It didn't usually work, but I started getting closer and closer to this date. Oh, I was so ecstatic when that girl –what was her name?- Ally Johnson, told me the year, the month, and the day. I was only a few days away from our very first encounter. I figured that after years of traveling to find you, I could wait a few days more to kill you." I needed a way out of this. Sherlock and the Doctor, surely they were planning something. What was taking them so long. Could Sherlock really not find the right notebook? Then it struck me. Sherlock didn't know exactly what he was looking for.

How could I tell the detective where the exorcism was written? I couldn't see him from this angle … but John. John could see him! I locked eyes with the solider, trying to remember Morse code. I always knew it would come in handy. I flicked my eyes away from John, praying that he knew what I was thinking. I refocused on the demon, trying to act naturally. One long blink. Three short blinks. A quick glance told me that John was focused on my eyes understanding exactly what I was doing. Soon enough I had spelt out "black notebook" all while looking like I was hanging onto every word the demon said (it was talking how dull it was, waiting for the right day to kill me). In my peripheral vision I saw John nod his head slightly showing that he understood the message. I wasn't sure if he knew who I wanted the information to go to, though, so I blinked three times quick (S) followed by four short blinks (H).

I didn't look at John again, and refocused on the demon standing in front of me. Apparently, he wasn't the most observant being on the planet, because he said nothing about the exchange. I listened back in as he was saying, "Did you like my message for you? I suppose it might have gotten a bit scrambled," recognition must have dawned in my eyes, because the demon looked pleased. "Oh so you did figure it out! Lovely. You must have been so confused." He laughed in a way that reminded me of the hyenas in Lion King, pretending to wipe a tear out of his eye. "You aren't confused now are you?"

I kept my face neutral, best not to give any more information to the demon. "Well, I'm sure you know what's going to happen to you now, dear." The demon's maple syrup tone had turned dark. I glanced down at Dean, willing him to get move, to help. He stayed down, completely passed out. He must have gotten hit by one of the pieces from the railing. Blood was still running out of the cuts and onto the wooden floor. Sam was still stuck in the demon's grip, thrashing furiously to get out, but it wasn't doing any good. Oh my babies, what could I do to help? This was all my fault.

I felt the tugging sensation in my stomach again, as the demon moved me closer. We were face to face now. The demon's eyes were alight with ecstasy. "And now…" The demon said joyfully. "It's time for you to die." He reached out his hand and pointed it directly at my heart. He squeezed his hand, as if grabbing the organ. There was a second when I thought the demon's powers weren't working. Relief began to flood my system, only to be turned into the most terrible pain. It felt like my heart was collapsing onto itself, growing smaller and smaller. I screamed silently, my voice still stolen by the demon. There was nothing I could do. I was going to die.

Suddenly, the pain didn't matter anymore. It was only my body that was reacting. My mind had retreated. I thought of how I had failed. These characters, my heroes, were all stuck in the universe, because of some demon with a vendetta against me. Still, this had been the best day of my life. I had gone inside the TARDIS. I had lunch with five fictional characters, instead of by myself. I got to see Sherlock and John together. Sam… Sam had kissed me. I suppose it was by some beautifully ironic source that determined the only way I could balance all this happiness was with my death. I wasn't sure if I was still screaming or not, but it hardly mattered. I closed my eyes waiting for a reaper to come get me.

The reaper never came. I felt the pressure on my chest release all at once. It felt like taking the first breath after getting the wind knocked out of you. I slid down to the floor, and I heard Sam and John slid hit the floor as well.

"Exorcizamus te, omnis, ummundus, spiritus," I heard someone chanting loudly. Was it Sherlock? "Omnis santanica potestas, omnis incursio infernalis adversarii,"

I felt a spray of water on my face, looking up I saw the Doctor shooting the demon with holy water from my extra water gun. It kept the demon from interfering as Sherlock continued the exorcism. "Omnis congregatio et secta diabolica. Ergo, draco maledicte. Ecclesiam tuam securi tibi facias libertate servire, te rigamus, audi nos!" Sherlock shouted.

The demon buckled, black smoke pouring out of my neighbor's mouth. The house seemed to eerily quiet as the demon was sent back to hell. For a moment no one moved. We were all too stunned by the events of the afternoon. I broke the silence, unintentionally by coughing. My heart felt like it was beating harder and slower than normal, and my throat was as dry as a desert. I struggled to sit, finding the Doctor at my side.

"Easy there. Take it slow." He placed a hand on my back, helping me to sit up straight. I leaned against the wall, taking deep breaths. One after another.

"How are you feeling?" John said, bending over to look at my eyes.

"I'm fine," I croaked, wincing at the sound my voice made. It was similar to how Sherlock sounded after he had been strangled in Soo Lin's flat. "Dean…"

"Sam is looking at Dean right now. I'll be there to patch him up as soon as I make sure you're functioning well." John answered evenly. I felt his hand grip my wrist, taking my pulse. After a moment he let go. "You seem to be doing fine." I coughed again.

"Sherlock, follow me downstairs." John directed. "She needs a glass of water, and I need to tend to Dean."

Sherlock nodded jerkily, glancing down at my face with a worried look. Well, I could tell he was worried, anyone else would just think he was unimpressed by the whole ordeal.

"Nice job, Sherlock." I exclaimed meekly. My throat was really sore.

"You weren't half bad either." He smirked. I smiled back, glowing in the compliment.

"Sherlock are you coming?" John called. He was already most of the way down the stairs. Sherlock rolled his eyes, following the army doctor to where Sam and Dean were.

"Can you shout down to them that there's a first aid kit in the bathroom on that floor?" I asked the Doctor, coughing once more.

"Of course," he responded. "John, there's a first aid kit in the bathroom. It looks like you'll be needing it."

"Thank you!" John called back.

I settled against the wall, closing my eyes. A nap sounded like a fantastic idea right now.

"No." The Doctor said shaking my shoulder. "You shouldn't be sleeping."

I groaned, shifting my position. The hard wood floor was incredibly uncomfortable.

"How did you find the water gun?" I asked the Doctor hoarsely.

"Sherlock was looking for the notebook. He kept muttering that one of them had the exorcism in it, but he couldn't tell which one. You, my dear, have a lot of notebooks in your room."

"I'm a writer. What would you expect?" I joked, coughing again. The Doctor laughed.

"I was helping him look for that before John tipped us on where it was. Then I realized we would need something to keep us the demon in place while Sherlock read the exorcism. I knew you had the water gun in your closet before, so I was hoping you might have a second. Of course, you did. You're very smart you know. You didn't even know the attack was coming, but you were prepared beyond a shadow of a doubt."

"I guess you could call it a product of obsession." I replied, grinning.

"Lucy!" I turned my head to face the new voice coming up the stairs. Sam ran up the last few steps of the staircase and over to me. The Doctor moved aside, smiling, to let Sam get closer. "Oh god, are you alright?"

He squatted down next to me, running his fingers lightly over my face and neck, looking for any injuries. As far as I knew there were none. Sam didn't seem to find any either. Taking my face in his hands, he smoothed a stray piece of hair behind my ear.

"I'm fine Sam. Just a little tired." I took in his face. There was a bandage just above his right eyebrow probably where a glass shard had cut him. There were a few cuts that were already scabbing over on his arms. All in all, he looked more beat up that I did.

"Here, the floor can't be that comfortable." He leaned over, wrapping one arm around my shoulders and the other under my knees. The hunter picked me up effortlessly. I wanted to protest, to yell and explain once again that I wasn't some damsel in distress. I was so tired though. It hurt to breathe, and it still felt like someone was still squeezing my heart, waiting for it to burst. So instead of protesting, I just turned in Sam's arms and buried my face in his shirt. He carried me into my bedroom and set me gently on the bed.

"Thanks," I said, peeking up at the hunter.

"It's not a problem." Sam replied with a warm smile, but it was laced with sadness. Where the hell did that come from? Oh. Ohhh. Right. I had forgotten about Sam's past attempts at romance. How idiotic of me. The fandom even joked about his "penis of death." It hadn't been too long ago that Jess was killed by the yellow eyed demon, and I know that he isn't over her death years after it happened. Now there's me. A new little flicker of hope for him, and I nearly got snuffed out. He was blaming himself, I knew it. That's what the Winchesters did: they killed monsters and felt responsible for the safety of everyone near them. It's an impossible weight to bear.

"Water and tea," Sherlock interrupted, walking into the bedroom careful to not disturb the salt line. "The water is because John said so. However, Mrs. Hudson says that tea with honey can fix anything, which is preposterous. I won't even begin to explain all the flaws in her logic." Sherlock set the cup and the mug onto the bedside table. "John instructed that you take the water first."

I rolled my eyes and took the tea mug. Raising it to my mouth, I took a small sip. It was heavenly. I had always been one to love tea, but I never learned to make it properly. Sherlock, having grown up in the center of the tea universe, made an excellent cuppa. The warm liquid was soothing as it went down my throat. He had probably put honey in it. I cradled the cup, protectively, as I thanked Sherlock.

"You should have tea John makes. He's even better at it than I am." Sherlock smirked. It was wonderful to hear him talk about John. His whole face lit up, and he seemed… well, he seemed like a man in love.

"He was definitely the one going through the void. The demon didn't switch bodies," The Doctor informed us, coming into the room. He held the 3D glasses up as an explanation. "There were void particles all over the man."

"How is he doing?" I asked anxiously. Possessed or not, my neighbor was like a second father to me. I didn't want him to die.

"He's fine. He'll come around soon enough."

"Where is he?" I inquired, making a move to get up. Sam pushed me back into a sitting position gently but firmly.

"I put him in the guest room across the hall." The Doctor replied. I nodded my approval and took another sip of tea. Sam had taken a folding chair from the closet in the hall and set it up next to my bed. Currently, he was running his thumb absently over the top of my hand, thinking about something. The Doctor was sitting backward on the chair at my desk. Sherlock was pacing again. They all seemed lost in thought. What could they possibly be thinking about?

Dean strode into the room, followed by a fairly relaxed John. Apparently, he hadn't been concussed or injured too much. Otherwise, John would have been more worried. Dean looked around the room a bit sheepishly, no doubt feeling embarrassed for having gotten himself knocked out. I cringed. It wasn't even his fault that he was hit by a piece of debris. The demon got to us before we were fully ready for it.

"The demon?" He asked us.

"Exorcised and back in hell," Sam responded to his brother.

"And the bird?"

"Lucy's fine, but you really shouldn't call her that." Sam said a little taken aback.

"No," Dean screwed up his face in disgust. "The stymaphalian bird," he corrected. I racked my thoughts. The bird, it hadn't been in the fight. Where was it? Suddenly I didn't feel so tired anymore, and the tea sat uneasily in my stomach.


	8. Chapter 8: The Stymphalian Bird

"I… The demon never called for the bird." Sam said. His thumb stilled its tracing of my hand. "I didn't even see it."

"No, the bird was there," I jumped in. "I saw it just before the demon showed itself. That was why it was wearing the one glove."

"The bird is still on the loose then?" John asked.

"Looks like it, and without the demon controlling it. The bird could be anywhere, and it's probably got an appetite for some human flesh now." Dean grimaced. "We have to find it."

A shattering of glass from the feature window above the front door, the only one the demon hadn't destroyed earlier, stopped us mid conversation. Turning slowly, we all looked through the door. Flying through the broken glass and staring back at us was the stymaphalian bird.

John closed the door with a loud bang, turning the lock as he did so.

"You think that's actually going to keep the bird out, John?" Sherlock sneered, pulling his blogger away from the door.

"No, I don't. It could buy us a few seconds, though." He replied quickly, transforming into a solider once more. He turned to the room, demanding "What are its weaknesses?"

"Noises," I said automatically. "Hercules killed them by making noises and then shooting it down." I scanned the room for the tambourine I had grabbed earlier. It was lying on the floor next to Sam's chair. I reached over him to grab it.

"I'll take that." Dean insisted, holding his hand out.

"No way, you were just knocked unconscious." I replied.

"And you were almost killed!" He snapped at me. I knew Dean. He would go out that door ready to sacrifice himself to save the rest of us. Didn't the idiot see the faults in that plan?

"We don't have time for this!" Sherlock yelled, grabbing the tambourine out of my hand. "John's the best shooter in this group. I'll distract the bird. The rest of you get out."

"Yes, sir." I answered, getting to my feet. Quickly grabbing my backpack and anything useful within reach, I slid the bag onto my shoulders and opened the window as wide as it could go.

"We can't go through the window," Sam argued.

"Trust me. I've gone out this way many times. It just requires a little jumping." I replied hastily. There was a bang against the door that sent splinters of wood through the room.

"We don't really have any time to argue Sam," Dean barked. I nodded at him. With that I ducked out of the window and onto the roof.

I had to say, the roof was usually such a peaceful place, but at the moment it felt like a death trap. I took a breath and continued down the roof. I turned around to watch as Sam, Dean, and the Doctor climbed out the window. Another bang echoed through the house, and I could hear the door exploding open, letting the bird into my room. The tambourine started to ring, and the gun was fired a few times. I could hear the bird still, so I don't think either was working.

"Keep going, Lucy!" The Doctor yelled at me.

I nodded at the Time Lord, and walked a little further down the roof. There was another crash that shook the roof. Unfortunately for me I had been standing right at the edge, preparing to jump onto the box that sat on the porch. A sudden quake followed by the sound of shattering glass, which I later realized was from the bird breaking through my bedroom window, caused me to lose my balance and topple off the roof. Instead of making the five foot jump onto the raised porch, I was falling nearly sixteen feet toward the garden. I tried to straighten myself. I had heard that by landing on their feet, some people had survived falls from taller buildings. I hoped to God that information wasn't wrong.

Approaching the ground, I braced for impact. I didn't land, though, instead of hitting the ground I was being lifted higher and higher. For a moment I relaxed. Someone had caught me. Then I realized that from my positioning no one could have done that. Something was digging into my shoulders much harder than I noticed a moment ago and it wouldn't let up. Terrified, I looked at my left shoulder and saw a set of brass talons instead of a friendly hand dragging me to safety.

The demon had been controlling it before, letting it only eat the hearts of its victims. I still had no idea how long they were stuck in the time stream, but the demon had said years. Now I don't know the exact dietary habits of Stymphalian birds, but it was probably hungry for its favorite food: fresh human.

"Shit," I breathed. The gunfire had stopped, and I twisted around to see John and Sherlock in the window. Sam was frozen on the roof, but the Doctor and Dean... They were nowhere in sight. I saw the Impala tear down the street in front of the house. Hoping I knew what they were doing, I shouted out to John. "Shoot it!"

"You'll fall!" Sam cried from the roof top. Well the alternative was being eaten, so I wouldn't mind falling in comparison. It probably would be a less painful death than being ripped apart by a brass beak. I was above them and traveling further away fast within a moment I would be out of range.

"SHOOT!"

John nodded solemnly and held the gun up. It fired with a loud bang.

The bullet grazed my arm as it lodged itself in the vulnerable underbelly of the bird. It croaked attempting to stay a flight. A second shot hit it square in the neck, causing it to flail for a moment before stilling completely. It fell like a stone and I followed along. The claws were still dug into my shoulders and I pulled at them, desperately trying to free myself. Holding my breath, I yanked at the talons.

It hurt like hell. I tried not to look at my shoulders as I continued to fall. At least the talons were out. That was the important part. Now I would fall a little more slowly. The bird had flown us at least forty-five feet into the air roughly the equivalent of a six story building, but I was quickly covering that distance. I spread out my limbs trying to slow the falling speed even more. A thought passed through my head wondering how similar to a flying squirrel I looked like at the moment. Someone, probably Sam, was shouting from below me. Dear God let me have been right.

A flash of blue, the loveliest blue in the world, caught my eye. I swiveled my head toward it, seeing the TARDIS come into view. I breathed a sigh of relief. I had been correct in my assumption of where Dean and the Doctor had gone off to.

The police box was flying somewhat sideways, and I felt momentarily bad for the Doctor, the TARDIS wasn't meant to fly like that. The doors were flung open, and I could see Dean standing the doorway, motioning for me to fall through the doors. I nodded, following the direction. I angled myself to fall into the TARDIS.

"Umpf" Dean grunted as he caught me, arm wrapping around my back to steady both of us.

"Brilliant catch!" The Doctor praised, looking up at the console.

"Thanks," Dean replied.

"You did great too, Dean!" The Doctor commended, missing the confused look on Dean's face.

"He was complimenting the TARDIS that first time," I whispered to Dean. "He loves it like you love the Impala."

"Ahh," Dean responded in understanding.

Frantically running around the TARDIS dashboard, the Doctor flipped a switch and rotated something that seemed similar to a steering wheel. He glanced up at us with a manic smile plastered on his face and shouted, "Hang on!"

Dean and I grabbed onto the railing, as the Time Lord landed his TARDIS. After landing safely (though slightly scrambled) on the ground, we both let go and let out a cheer. The Doctor walked over, satisfied, with his hand in his pockets. I pulled him and Dean into a hug.

"Thank you, thank you, thank you," I repeated on end. Both of them returned the hug.

"Don't mention it," Dean grinned.

"You're welcome, Lucy," the Doctor replied, beaming.

"Lucy?" Sam begged to know, bursting in through the TARDIS doors. There were tear tracks on his cheeks, but hope in his eyes. Dean and the Doctor both let go of me and moved to the side, letting Sam see me.

"Oh God," he rushed over, pulling me into a crushing hug. He was nearly a foot taller than me, so his hug basically enveloped me into a bubble of Sam. Feeling his ragged breath slow as I clutched him back, we stood like that for several moments, oblivious to the world around us. I realized then that it was going to break my heart if he left back through the void, and I clutched him harder.

"Lucy. Sam," John said softly to the right of us. "You're going to have to let go. Lucy is losing a lot of blood."

"What?" I asked, pulling away. A quick look at both my shoulders, or what remained of them, and I passed out cold.

"Let's get her head elevated, and Sherlock go get her a glass of water," I heard John directing. Everything was a bit fuzzy, and why was I on my back?

"As I recall, she prefers tea to water."

"Sherlock, who's the doctor here you or me?"

I giggled a little. I adored it when John bossed Sherlock around. I heard someone, march out of the room, probably Sherlock. I opened my eyes, blinded momentarily, before registering the TARDIS ceiling. Oh right, I passed out.

"She's awake," Sam said, leaning toward my face. "Are you okay?"

"I feel fine, maybe a little uncomfortable. My shoulders are stinging a lot, and I feel really hot and really cold at the same time." I saw Sam glance at my shoulders and grimace. Racking my brain for any other pain, I realized my feet were aching, which was weird. Why would my feet be hurting? I relayed that information onto Sam as well.

"Course they do, dumbo. You never put your shoes back on. You've been running around sock-footed for the past few hours."

I lifted my head to glance at Sam's feet. "Apparently, so have you."

"This is why I wear shoes all the time," he joked, making me smile.

"I've been meaning to ask Sammy," Dean started, "why are you wearing one rainbow sock?"

I stuck my leg into the air to show Sam's sock on my foot. "We made a bet in the diner, and we both lost, so we had to give up our socks."

"What was the bet?"

"Well I bet Sam that the waitress wasn't into you-"

"And I bet Lucy that you would still be the one leaving with her number."

"Wait… so that waitress chick was into me?" Dean smirked.

"Well, when I asked she said that she was, but when she wrote down the number it turned out she wasn't interested in the male gender." I laughed at the way the smirk slid off Dean's face. "It's okay man," I consoled. "You'll be meeting your own angel soon enough."

Sherlock walked back into the TARDIS with a tea mug in one hand and some cookies in the other.

"Sherlock," John said, putting his hand on the bridge of his nose. "What part of 'get Lucy water' translated into 'get Lucy tea and biscuits'?"

"The part that knows Lucy prefers tea to water. I already told you." Sherlock handed me the mug. It smelled even better than last time. He handed the plate of cookies to Sam, who started to nibble on one of them.

I took a sip of tea, feeling instantly relaxed. I looked at John asking, "So how bad is it?"

"Well," he looked at the marks the talons had left behind. "You're going to need a few stitches on both your shoulders. The talons were dug pretty far in, and the way you tore them out didn't help anything. Luckily the bullet only grazed your arm," I could feel John tensing up. Of course he blamed himself for hitting me. It wasn't as if the bird had been flying a few miles per hour and I was swinging helplessly under it, I thought sarcastically. "So that will only need to be bandaged.

"Is it dead?" In the middle of everything, I had forgotten to ask.

"As a doornail," Dean answered. "John's got good aim."

"I was in the army for a few years." John answered, kneeling next to the first aid kit that he'd brought over from the house. He glanced at the cut on my arm, "but I'm getting out of practice."

"Why aren't you still in it?" Sam asked.

"I got shot." John said bluntly, taking a needle and threading it.

"Really? I would have never been able to tell," Dean replied.

"Obviously, because you only see, never observe." Sherlock muttered. Dean shrugged without argument.

"Now Lucy, I'm sorry to ask this, but you're going to have to take off your shirt. I can't get to your shoulders well enough otherwise."

"Okay," I said in a small voice. Honestly the last thing I wanted to do was take off my shirt in front of five of my idols. I mean, they were all so fit from running around after criminals, or aliens, or ghosts. I was fit too, but just not terribly so. I guess spending hours in front of a laptop will do that to you. Sucking in a slow breath, I tugged my shirt over my head. I could feel my cheeks burning red, as I shifted uncomfortable under the stare of John Watson. I really had nothing to be worried about, though. As expected, John was professional with his work. I tried to ignore looking at anyone else, but as far as I could see Sherlock and the Doctor were both distracted by their thoughts and didn't seem to care about my appearance much at all.

"Here," Sam offered, taking off his jacket. He laid it on top of me, careful to avoid putting it on the areas that John needed to access.

"Thanks," I replied bashfully, trying to keep another round of blushing from occurring. Sam really was a sweetie, and I was falling head over heels for him.

"This should numb it," John said rubbing some medicine into the torn skin. I felt the gnawing pain in my shoulders go away. I assumed that he was cleaning the wound as well, but I wasn't watching.

"It's working. I can't feel anything."

"Good. Now, I'm going to stitch you up in a few places. It might be best to avoid looking at the needle. It tends to make patients anxious and imagine their own pain."

"Sounds good," I concurred, turning my head to look at Sam. He had eaten two biscuits (biscuits? Oh wow my English and American vocabularies were really beginning to blur) by now, and it seems like Dean had eaten at least one. I set my tea mug on the floor, beside my leg, so I wouldn't accidently move my shoulder, taking a sip of the warm liquid.

"So Doctor," I said attempting to distract myself. I could just barely feel the needle going in and out of my skin. "What have you been thinking about so intensely?"

The Doctor looked up from the screen he'd been staring at for the past ten minutes. "The demon," he answered.

"We killed him didn't we?" I asked.

"Sent him back to hell, technically," Sam corrected, taking my hand, so I had something I could grip while John sewed up the talon marks.

"Whatever," I rolled my eyes, teasingly. The tone was lost a bit, while I was clenching my teeth shut. "Didn't we finish him off?"

"Weelll…. That's the interesting part," the Doctor said, running his hand through his hair (damn it was even sexier in person). I wasn't sure if that meant he was thinking or if he was nervous about something. Probably both, I decided. "The demon is finished, if you want to put it that way, but the timeline was off. We killed him before we've even met him."

"What?" Dean asked, confused.

"Basically the demon that met us for the first time hasn't actually taken possession of Lucy's neighbor, yet. However, it will and we're going to be the ones to fight it. Somehow the demon has to get pushed into the time hole along with his bird. For the monsters, years will pass without our noticing, but they will eventually return to the correct time period as we saw them do less than an hour ago."

"Why don't we just kill the bastard next time we see it?" Dean asked.

"We can't it would disrupt the whole time steam too much," the Doctor said evenly.

"So we're just going to let the demon and his pet bird kill innocent people?"

"It's either that or create a paradox, which would be much worse." The Doctor argued. "Believe me, I wish it didn't have to be this way either, but it has to be. A paradox would only make the original tear worse, and we really can't have that."

"We're going to have to face him again?" I hissed out through my teeth. The numbing medicine wasn't nearly as strong as I wished it were. I squeezed Sam's hand even tighter.

"You're hurt. You really can't come with us." Sam said with a glance to the stitching Doctor Watson was doing.

"Wrong, leave me out you and you'll alter the time line. The demon had something against me and me alone. He barely bothered to look at you all, when he came into the house. I'll end up being in the middle of everything one way or another." I replied.

Out of the corner of my eye I could see John returning to the first aid kit, taking out the neatly rolled gauze cloth and some tape. I took a quick peek at my right shoulder. There were three sets of stitches, one for each talon from the bird. The stitches themselves were black and in neat little rows. The left shoulder looked about the same. Any prior knowledge aside, John was a fantastic doctor. I went to flex my shoulders to test the thread, but John put a hand on my arm to stop me.

"It would be best not to disrupt the stitches as much as you can." He soothed, while wrapping the gauze around my shoulder and around my chest and back. He was maneuvering the cloth expertly around the straps of my sports bra. I silently thanked him for doing so. After some more gauze wrapping around the other shoulder and the bullet wound in my arm, a few pieces of tape were added to hold it all in place. John sat back on his heels to examine his handiwork.

"I think that should do," he said more to himself than to me.

"Thank you, John." I said gratefully, picking up my tea much once more. It was much more difficult with the bandages and the pain was settled in again. However, I was delighted to find the tea was still warm as I took a sip.

"Don't mention it," he smiled, packing away the first aid kit.

"It's getting late," the Doctor cut into the conversation. He had been talking with Dean previously and whatever they had said Dean seemed to agree with the time lord. "I've offered for you all to stay in the TARDIS. I insist really, because she's already made rooms for you all."

"Any bunk beds?" I asked before I could stop myself.

"No… would you prefer a bunk bed?" The Doctor asked curiously.

"I'm good actually, I was… I was just wondering." I really needed to watch my tongue a little more closely.

"No bunk beds then? I don't really see why anyone would dislike them, now that I think about it. Bunk beds are kind of…. Cool?"

"You could say that," I laughed. I shifted to get up, before realizing that I was still wearing only Sam's coat and my current shirt was ripped and stained with blood. It really was a shame. I loved that shirt. It had the deathly hallows mark on it and everything.

"I- uh- does anyone have a shirt I could borrow?" I inquired awkwardly, looking around the room,

"Give me a minute," Dean said surprisingly. He ran out the door and returned in no less than five minutes holding a new shirt for me. "There you go."

"Thank you so much Dean." I said, slipping the shirt over my head. I felt the stitches pull a little bit and the sleeves kept getting caught on the bandages. I could tell these injuries were going to be a pain.I hadn't noticed what the front said as the hunter handed the clothing article to me, so many of my t- shirts were black that I could never tell them apart. I glanced down at the front and read the print: _Some army doctors marry some consulting detectives. Get over it._ Blushing fiercely, I turned to Dean. "Was this seriously the best shirt you could find?"

"I- what's the matter with it?" He asked defensively.

"I believe it's a shirt showing support for gay marriage by using John and I as an example," Sherlock responded to Dean's question.

"Well you two do make a cute couple." I grumbled. Sherlock and John both glanced quickly at each other before looking away just as fast. They really did belong together, but it seemed like neither of them were willing to make the jump.

"Where's my room?" I asked, turning to the Doctor. I was still a little embarrassed by the shirt, but really there was nothing wrong with it. Plus it was soft from a lot of use, which made it even more appealing at the moment.

"Here let me show you!" He said, springing out of his seat. "Right this way."


	9. Chapter 9: A date

As I went to get up and follow the Doctor, a sharp pain shot down through my arm. I lost my balance and landed shoulder-first on the floor with a dull _thud._ Ah yes, the joys of being injured I thought with a grimace. At least there'd be some impressive scars from today's events. I'd always liked scars, because of the stories behind them. I thought for a second on my scars and the telling someone the story of how I got them from a metal bird. I would sound probably sound insane.

"I-uhh... I might need some help getting up," I grunted, reluctantly from my position on the floor.

"Oh yeah, of course," Sam said at once. He put one arm strongly behind my back for support and helped lifted me up onto my feet.

"Thanks," Without thinking I went to grab my backpack, only to have Sam snatch it out of my reach.

"It's too heavy for you to carry without ripping any of the stitches." Sam protested. I glanced over at John, but he wasn't paying attention to our conversation. He listening to something Sherlock and Dean were discussing.

"I doubt it," I retorted. A throbbing pain coursing through my shoulders told me that Sam was probably right, but I wasn't going to let him win that easily. Instead I bent down and took the tea mug along with one of the remaining cookies. Sam scowled at me. I simply shrugged in reply, which sent another jolt of pain down my spine. Oh, it was so pleasant having injuries.

"All ready then?" The Doctor asked, bouncing on his toes.

"Yes!" I grinned barely containing my excitement.

"This way," the Doctor gestured with his head. I entered the passageway after the Time Lord. The ceiling was rounded and floor changed from the metal grate to gray and brown slate that was cold under my socked feet. The lights from the ceiling lit everything in a warm, other-worldly glow, and it took my breath away. I couldn't believe that I was in the TARDIS, like beyond the console. As far as I could remember most of the interior of nine and ten's TARDIS hadn't been shown on screen.

"This is so cool!" I whispered excitedly, afraid that if I spoke to loud this would turn out to all just be a dream.

"Yeah, yeah it is. Isn't it?" The Doctor beamed, walking backward to see me. We passed by a door. Its knob was shiny and the green paint was crisp as if it had just been installed. Actually, that might be the case. I peered down the hallway and saw rows of doorways on either side of the hall, continuing beyond my range of vision.

"How many rooms are in the TARDIS?" I asked. I stood on my tiptoes trying to see further down the hallway.

"Thousands upon thousands. I used to know the exact number, but I've lost count over the years. "

"Wow." I replied in a small voice, suddenly feeling very insignificant.

"Yeah, well hundreds of years of time travel does that. New rooms are added every time I have guests, and they just build up after a while."

"These are all bedrooms?" Sam asked behind me. I had nearly forgotten he was there.

"Weell," the Doctor glanced over his shoulder, "most of these rooms are."

"What types of rooms are there besides the bedrooms?"

"There's a swimming pool, a library, a kitchen, a theater—"

"A theater?" I probably shouldn't have been too surprised by that. I mean, he had a swimming pool.

"Oh yeah, it's best for those boring days like Sunday afternoons, and the best part is that it's got every movie ever made. I never have to wait for sequels!" The Doctor grinned.

"I'm so jealous," I moaned. "I've been waiting forever for the next season of Sherlock. They're still in the middle of filming and it'll be months before the first episode airs."

"You know I've met Arthur Conan Doyle a few times, so I know who Sherlock Holmes is. I've never seen the show, though."

"Neither have I," Sam piped up. "I haven't heard of Doctor Who either."

"Nor have I heard of Supernatural." The Doctor thought for a moment. "I think we must all exist in incredibly similar realities, because we are aware of similar references but know nothing of each other." The Time Lord paused, "I'll tell you what, Lucy. Once all of this is over, I'll pop ahead a few months and get you the next season of Sherlock."

My eyes widened in shock, "Would you really do that for me?"

"Absolutely!"

"Ahh! Thank you so much!" I was jumping up and down, despite holding a still semi-full cup of tea. Thankfully, it didn't spill that much. I grabbed the Doctor in a hug, which hurt my shoulders a little, but I couldn't care less.

"You're welcome," The Doctor beamed, hugging me back for a moment. I could hear Sam laughing behind me.

"You really care about these television shows, huh?" The hunter asked, as I untangled myself from the hug.

"I- uhh… yeah, a little bit." I hadn't meant to show how much of a fangirl I was to everyone, because they might get a bit freaked out. I was just trying to act cool around them- a task much easier said than done.

"Doesn't sound like just a little bit," Sam nudged with a hint of a smile.

"Well-" I started, "fine. I'm a _huge_ fangirl over the shows. Like I told you earlier, I know basically everything I could possibly know about you all. Personalities, plot lines, the sub dialogue that most viewers miss, I know all of that. The shows are my obsession, and I guess my escape from the boring life I usually live."

"Not so boring anymore, is it?" Sam asked grinning, but a flash of regret crossed his face as he looked at my bandaged shoulders.

"No, and I wouldn't trade it for anything. My shoulders will heal. I think… I guess this sounds a bit insane (and maybe it is), but if I had to do this all over again, knowing that I get hurt, I still would open the front door and invite you in for pie. Believe it or not, this has been the best day of my life." Shrugging my shoulders, I lowered my gaze down to my mismatched socks. Even with my friends in high school I was rarely this honest. It was true, though. I'd repeat this day a thousand times, because for once in my life I felt truly alive.

I opened my mouth to say how I wished they didn't have to go back to their own realities, and how I almost wished that it was impossible for them to go back there. That would be unfair to say, however. They have lives to lead and adventures to accomplish, so I closed my mouth slowly instead, keeping those thoughts to myself. Even if it ripped my soul into tiny pieces- best to enjoy the present while it was happening, instead of worrying over what might happen in the future.

"Here's your room, Lucy," the Doctor said after a moment more of walking. He opened the door, allowing me to go inside the room first. Compared to the hallway, the room was even more stunning. The ceiling was high with glittering strands of fairy lights hanging from it, just high enough to avoid grazing Sam's head (he was ducking it anyway, the tall, adorable moose). The walls had posters from every fandom I was obsessed plastered onto them. Particularly a poster of Loki, where it seemed his eyes were literally breaking through the thin paper and staring into my soul. I gazed back, unable to look away. I could hear a faint popping noise as each and every one of my ovaries exploded.

"Who's this guy?" Sam asked, walking over to the Loki poster. He had set my bag down on a beanbag in the corner of the room, and apparently noticed that his head wasn't in danger of being hit by the fairy lights.

"That's Loki," I responded tearing my eyes away from the poster to focus on Sam instead.

"The Norse God of trickery," he muttered his forehead creased and his lips pursed, as if he were trying to figure out why anyone would like such a cruel, yet devilishly handsome trickster.

"Yep, but he doesn't always look like that. This is the Avenger's version of Loki. If you ever met the trickster god, he'd probably look a little different." My mind brought up an image of Richard Speight Jr. Yeah, "Loki" looked quite different on Supernatural. Also his idea on world domination differed a great deal. I made a mental sticky note to do a comparison on the two Lokis at a later date.

"Huh, and this is the type of stuff you're into?" Sam asked, scrunching his eyebrows together.

"Well…yeah." I responded, feeling a tad insecure.

"Nice," Sam nodded apparently deciding to embrace her quirks. His eyes continued to study the posters on the wall, as I looked over at the Doctor. The Time Lord was standing off to the side, his arms crossed and grinning from ear to ear.

"So…what do you think of it?" he asked. I caught a hint of his Scottish accent and grinned.

"It's absolutely amazing! I don't- how did you even know I was into all this stuff?"

"A quick look around your bedroom and the TARDIS has always been very good at constructing rooms." He beamed. "You have a very fine book collection my dear."

"Thanks," I blushed. "You could borrow a few books if you'd like-" a yawn escaped from me, "-sorry. But yeah, you could borrow a book or two as long as you promise to bring them back."

"I might take you up on that deal," the Doctor said. "Right now though, I really think you ought to sleep. You've had a long day, and those injuries will need a while to heal." He rocked back and forth on his feet, the iconic converse sneakers squeaking on the wood flooring. He shoved his hands in his pockets, and spun around once before turning back to me waiting for a response. The questioning tilt of his head was endearingly familiar and I allowed myself to imagine traveling the universe with this brilliant albeit quirky alien.

"That's probably a good idea," I agreed. I hadn't really been tired before, but as soon as the Doctor mentioned it, a wave of exhaustion crashed over me. Suddenly, it was a struggle to stay on my feet, and I trudged over to the bed, my feet dragging behind me. Sam quickly came to my side in case I needed any help. The Doctor was hovering behind me as back- up. To be honest, I felt a bit crowded. Injured or not, I really didn't want all this extra attention. It made me feel weak and vulnerable. I figured, however, there was no use protesting. It would be better to pick battles where they mattered, and right now they were just trying to be helpful.

Sam guided me under the dark purple covers of the bed: jeans, socks and all. I was too tired to really care. Plus, it wouldn't be the first time I fell asleep in jeans. There had been many nights where I had worked myself to exhaustion typing up on term papers, or writing a story late into the evening. I shifted under the covers, trying to find a comfortable position, but that didn't seem to exist. Eventually, I ended up lying on my back staring up at the glow-in the dark stars on the ceiling, a position I disliked greatly, but it seemed to be the best arrangement for keeping my stitches in place.

"All situated?" Sam asked kindly, eyes roaming my face for any sign of pain.

"Yep," I yawned. Boy, did I feel like a ten year-old, being tucked in and looked after. There were definitely worse fates than this, though.

"Right then," Sam answered a bit awkwardly. "Umm, sleep well."

"Goodnight, Lucy." The Doctor echoed tapping my left foot in an affectionate manner. "Come on then Sam, let's get back to the others. We should move Mr. Eddie from the guest room to the TARDIS, for his safety."

"Right, I'll be there in a second," Sam responded. The corner of the Doctor's mouth rose in a grin.

"Of course, I'll meet you outside." The door squeaked slightly as the Doctor closed it behind him as he went into the hallway.

I was fighting to keep my eyes opened, watching Sam. Why had he wanted to stay?

"I was thinking," Sam started, "that maybe we could go on a date tomorrow. If nothing eventful is happening, it could be a nice respite from all this chaos."

"I think I would like that," I agreed after a moment. Normally, I would have reacted with more enthusiasm, but I was beginning to feel like I was drunk on warm milk. My eyelids closed themselves shut and refused to open again, as if weighed down by iron lashes.

"Sounds perfect. Sleep now Lucy. Pardon me for saying so, but you look like you really need it." Sam bent down, kissing my forehead lightly. His rumbling voice, like a sunny day dipped in honey, lulled me off into the darkness of sleep.

When I awoke, who knows how many hours later, there was a small pile of fresh clothes sitting on a chair across the room. I stretched carefully, trying to not disturb any of the stitches. They tugged at the sore skin anyway. It felt like someone was trying to cut into my shoulder with a butter knife. The pain wasn't unbearable, but it definitely wasn't comfortable. I groaned as I made my way over the chair.

The clothing was sitting in a neat stack, jeans on the bottom, a dark blue t-shirt, one of my few plaid shirts, and my brown leather jacket on top. It had Winchester-fashion-style written all over it. Quickly but carefully pulling on the clothes, I glanced at the mirror. My black hair was sticking up at random angles, but lifting my arms high enough to reach it took too much effort. So I left it as it was, disheveled and chaotic. In contrast my skin was a shade paler than normal, making me look a bit like a modern version of Snow White. I turned my attention to the outfit, someone (probably Sam) had picked out. I looked like a mini, female version of the Winchesters. A smirk crossed my lips, talking to my reflection I said, "I look good as a hunter."

My gaze refocused on the mirror, on something out of place behind me. I turned around scanning the opposite wall. A yellow post-it note had been stuck next to the Loki poster. Walking over to it, I removed the note from the wall and began to read:

"_I realized that once you got up and changed, you'd probably try to take your backpack. You can't take that much weight on your shoulders quite yet. It'll rip out the stitches in an instant (I mean really, your bag weighs a ton. For a while I thought you were actually storing bricks in it). I took the liberty of carrying your stuff back into the consol area. I assure you that it will be safe. _

_Hope you slept well_

_-Sam"_

A slight smile crossed my lips. It was really sweet how much Sam was looking out for me. Chances are he was right too. I would have picked up my backpack without thinking about it and torn the stitches. As I tucked the note in my pocket my fingers grazed another piece of paper. I pulled it out and laughed. It was the slip that the waitress had written her number down on. It seemed like a small eternity since we had gone to the diner. I slid the number back into my pocket alongside Sam's note, thinking that I could put the two notes into my writer's notebook as keepsakes from this adventure.

I padded out of my room (Sam had forgotten to grab me a pair of shoes) and turned left down the hallway, hoping I was heading in the correct direction. As I continued to walk along the hallway I could hear someone talking. A few steps more, and I was certain someone was talking quietly in one of the rooms. Guessing the appropriate door, I pressed my ear against it.

"John." A low baritone voice repeated over and over with a rhythm similar to waves crashing on the shore.

I stood away from the door, thinking. Despite knowing it would be an invasion of privacy, I really just wanted to see if Sherlock was actually in the same room as John. Just one quick peek, they were my OTP after all. It was irresistible.

"Hello umm…Sexy?" I whispered, not knowing what else to call the TARDIS, "would you mind just installing a temporary peep-hole in this door? I mean… I just want to see if you know…." I trailed off, hoping that the TARDIS would understand that I was really in love with the idea of Sherlock and John being in love.

Apparently she did understand, because only a second later a peep-hole appeared. I immediately pressed my eye up to it. I took in the room for a moment. It was very plain, entirely unlike mine. Everything was either white or beige. In all respects it looked like a basic hotel room. In the middle of the wall adjacent to the door was a single bed, in which Sherlock and John were both laying. John was asleep, curled up on his side next to Sherlock. One of his arms was under his pillow, and the other was across the detective's waist. I nearly squealed in excitement. Sherlock was also on his side with his back to the door, so he was facing John.

It was as if the detective wanted to cuddle John like a teddy bear, but was afraid what would happen if his army doctor woke up and wasn't actually interested in him that way. I sympathized with the detective. John was probably one of the most complex characters I'd ever encountered, and I couldn't imagine trying to guess what he was thinking on a daily basis. Sherlock, however, was taking the rare moment of John's sleep to stroke his sandy blond hair. I couldn't tell from this angle, but it looked like Sherlock had his nose pressed in soldier's hair as well, cataloguing the scent of John Watson. Sherlock's other hand was wrapped around John's torso loosely, tracing swirling patterns into the loose t-shirt John was wearing. I could just barely hear John sigh and move closer to the detective. In response, I thought I saw Sherlock just barely brush his lips on John's forehead.

With great effort, I pulled away from the peep-hole. Fictional or not, I was invading their privacy, and why should I even be allowed to watch the sacred moments Sherlock had with John. The two of them, though! I squeezed my eyes shut to avoid breaking out in a happy dance. Sherlock was so definitely in love with John Watson, and I knew, _I absolutely knew_, it had to be a mutual love.

"Thanks Sexy," I whispered. The peep-hole in the door disappeared, and the TARDIS made a low, happy sort of sound. I took it as a "you are very welcome."

"What are you smiling about?" The Doctor asked as soon as I entered the room.

"The fact that you told John and Sherlock that the TARDIS didn't have any rooms with double beds," I responded automatically. The Doctor grinned in reply.

"I figured why not? If they really wanted two separate beds, they would have asked."

"Wait so the two dudes are sleeping with each other?" Dean asked, walking up behind me while rubbing the sleep out of his eyes.

"Seems to be the case," the Doctor beamed.

"Problem?" I challenged, raising an eyebrow. This was my OTP, and I was damned if Dean interfered with it, because of his own repressed homosexual feelings. No one insults my OTP. Well, no one who wants to live, anyway.

"Hmmph, No, I guess." Dean made his way over to one of the railings and leaned against it. "Hey Lucy, do I end up with a guy or a girl in the future? Are you allowed to tell me that?"

"Well… I don't think I can tell you that really. All I can say is that your perfect angel is out there." I shrugged. There was that angle reference again; I really needed to stop phrasing it like that. Dean's smart. He'll eventually get suspicious.

Thankfully, I was saved from any further questioning by Sam walking through the TARDIS's front doors. There were two full plastic bags in his left hand and a tray of coffee in his right. "I got breakfast!"

"Perfect, I'm starving," Dean responded, lumbering over to Sam. He took one of the bags from Sam and rooted around in it before pulling out an everything bagel. "Hey you got a table we can put this stuff on Doc?"

"Yes, of course," The Doctor took a few steps to his left, then bent down and loosened one of the metal gratings. He pulled out a small foldout table from under it and set it up in the middle of the room, far enough away from the console that there was no risk of spilling anything on it.

"There you go," He said satisfied, dusting off his hands on his trousers. Dean and Sam set the food and drinks on the table as the Doctor slid the metal grate back in place, so none of us accidently toppled into the storage hole.

"I figured John and Sherlock were still sleeping, because they were about to pass out of exhaustion before they went to their bedroom earlier. So, I only got four drinks. I can make another run, when they get up." Sam lifted up two coffee cups from the tray. "Umm, this one is yours Dean. I had them add in extra shot of caffeine."

"Thanks Sammy," Dean took the coffee with his left hand, already chewing on the bagel, no cream cheese required.

"And this one is… hot chocolate. Right I got hot chocolates for you two," Sam addressed the Doctor and me. Holding out the cup to the Time Lord, "no offense, Doctor, but you don't really seem like the type that needs caffeine. You're a bit hyper already."

The Doctor shrugged, not making any argument against it and accepted the drink. Sam took the other two cups out of the container. His shoes tapped lightly on the floor, as he walked over to me and extend out his left hand. "And you don't really seem like the coffee type. Actually that's what prompted the coffee shop run; you don't have coffee in the kitchen… just tea and hot chocolate."

"Sorry," I cringed, taking the hot chocolate. I hadn't been thinking about entertaining any guests, though. All of this was sort of sudden. Otherwise I might have prepared.

"No, it's fine," Sam tipped his coffee back and swallowed a few gulps. "It gave me a chance to check out the town again. There's a restaurant called Acquerello. Would you like to go there tonight?"

I scrunched my eyebrows together involuntarily, thinking if I wanted to go or not. Acquerello was the fanciest and most expensive restaurant in town. Only the wealthiest people ever seem to go there. I don't think there was a dish that was under thirty dollars, and the atmosphere demanded the guests to dress formally. I didn't have the money or the ability to dress in formal clothing (because of the stitches) at the moment. I voiced these hesitations to Sam, and then asked "there's a bar down town that serves good food, and it's not too expensive."

Sam relaxed more and more as I continued speaking. The tension I hadn't realized was there oozed out of his shoulders, and a grin spread across his face. "That sounds fantastic, Lucy," He said when I had finished talking.

"Prefect," I beamed back at my hunter.

"Are you sure you won't get cold?" I looked down at my outfit once more. I hadn't really changed since this morning, so I was still wearing jeans and my leather jacket. The only difference was now I was wearing a necklace and some make-up.

"No, Sam, I'll be perfectly fine. It's autumn here, not the middle of an Alaskan winter."

"Fair enough," Sam laughed at my sarcastic reply. The sound was a deep and hearty and warmed me to the tips of my toes. The hunter stepped out of the driver's seat, motioning that I stay seated. He walked around the car and opened the passenger's door for me, saying "After you my dear."

"Thank you," I smiled as I stepped out of the car, mimicking a curtsy. Sam bowed in response and closed the door behind me.

We walked into the bar and seated ourselves at a table near the back of the room. The bar was filled with the pleasant buzz of background noise, and the lights were bright enough to allow us to see each other, but dim enough to be unaware of everyone else in the area. Only about half the tables were full, mostly with couples like Sam and I. Sam and I? A couple? I still hadn't quite wrapped my head around the thought. I mean, he's a fictional character. Yet, by some bizarre happenstance he was now a non- fictional character. I tried not to dwell on the thought of defining Sam as fictional or real too much, because it made my head hurt (If I was dating him in real life, that made him real right? Even if his origin was fictional?).

"How are you feeling?" Sam asked, breaking my train of thought.

"Much better than I probably should feel, but that isn't a necessarily a bad thing." I replied, tucking away my thoughts about fiction versus reality. "I can't move my arms much for fear of tearing any stitches, but nothing really hurts."

"That's great!" Sam exclaimed breaking into a grin. "You must be the resilient type."

"Really?" I tilted my head to stare at him. I wouldn't use the word resilient to describe myself in the least. I was stubborn, sure. But at the moment my shoulders were stiff and my body was still exhausted despite sleeping earlier. I honestly couldn't tell why I looked like the resilient type to him.

"Yeah, I mean you're holding up pretty well right now. Most people wouldn't be in your case. I mean you have stitches on both shoulders, a cut on your arm from grazing a bullet, and your heart probably still feels like it's being squeezed by the demon, which I'm pretty sure is normal." Sam paused for a moment looking at me gleefully, not focusing on the affects all those events had on my body but on my mental toughness to them. I was about to say something to cut if off before it began when he launched into the next part of his speech.

"Then on top of being resilient, you're brilliant. You tried to exorcise that demon before any of us thought of it. John even told me that you managed to communicate with him using Morse code by blinking your eyelids!"

"I think you're giving me too much credit," I was sure I was blushing. I could feel the heat of it in my cheeks.

"No, you really are. And then it feels like every time I turn around you've got another talent." My blank stare prompted him to continue with more detail. "Like yesterday in the elevator when you took Dean down? I've never seen someone do that as effectively as you did. Not to be rude, but I honestly wasn't expecting it from someone your size."

"Well I mean we all probably look like ants too you seeing that you're a six billion foot tall Sasquatch." I giggled at that last statement as Sam same threw his head back in laughter.. I carried on talking before Sam could start again. "Honestly, I wouldn't have expected it either. It's all about leverage, and using your opponent's strengths against himself."

"I feel like Dad mostly taught us offense types of karate. Maybe one day when your shoulders are better you could show me some stuff from your system?"

"Yeah, of course!" I beamed. We talked about martial arts for a little while longer before a waitress came over to take our orders. When she asked about drinks, I told Sam to pick a beer that I'd probably like.

Within a few minutes of taking our orders, the waitress returned with two beer bottles. I instantly wrapped my hands around mine, a habit I had gotten into from drinking too many cups of tea. Instead of the warm kiss to the palm of my hand, the bottle was cold with drops of condensation rolling down it. Obviously, I didn't drink often.

Sam took a sip from his and prompted me to try mine (he had gotten us the same kind). I lifted the cold bottle to my lips and poured a bit into my mouth. It was crisp and smooth, definitely one of the better beers I had tried in the few months since I turned twenty- one.

"How is it?" Sam asked, the corners of his eyes crinkling in a smile.

"Really good," I responded. I berated myself for the lack of eloquence, but Sam didn't seem to mind. In fact he was grinning even wider. "What are you smiling about?"

"This, us, it's a lot of fun." He shrugged still smiling. "In contrast to the "excitement" of the case it's enjoyable to do something relatively normal and relaxing."

"I can see what you mean. I always used to wonder why you and Dean (mostly Dean) went on so many dates. I guess it was the only bit of normalness you ever really got in your lives." Well I said dates but it was really more like one night stands for Dean and dead girl friends for Sam. I desperately hoped that I didn't turn into one of the dead girlfriends.

"Well, not exactly. We do lots of normal stuff. We eat. We sleep. We drive. The only not normal bits come in between all the normal ones. But for us, all of this is normal. Always has been."

"Huh," I sat stumped for a moment. After taking another sip of beer, I opened my mouth to speak again. "It's not all normal for my perspective. Normal for me is going to school, getting good grades, training in karate, and every once in a while attempting to write a book."

"People have different perceptions of normal," Sam replied simply.

"Yeah, I guess they do," the corner of my mouth rising in a half smile.

Just then the waitress came back with our food. "Who ordered the mac and cheese?"

"That would be me." I said raising my hand slightly. She set the plate in front of me, and the bowl of salad in front of Sam. After we had both smiled and thanked her, we turned back to our conversation.

"Now let me ask you a question," Sam said, spearing a forkful of salad from his dish. "Why do you want to help us so much if we're just fictional characters in your universe?"

"Well, to me you are all much more than fictional. You're like my friends and family. Granted I've never talked to any of you before… two days ago, but I'd followed all your adventures and analyzed your characters to figure out your emotional standpoints and how you react to certain events. Like how under stress, Doctor Watson will revert back to his army training, and his first objective will be to get everyone else to safety. It isn't that he's self sacrificing, just… he doesn't put himself first." I paused for a moment, debating what else to tell Sam about my favorite little hedgehog. I figured that I shouldn't say too much else about John's life. After all, he wasn't just a fictional character any more. But I couldn't resist one more statement, "Also between you and me, John and Sherlock are in a relationship at the moment whether they realize it or not."

"You know, I was wondering about that." Sam nodded with a smile. "It seemed like they were, but it also seemed like they weren't acknowledging it. They must not realize it at all… weird." Sam took a bite of salad, while I attempted to fight back the impulse of my next statement. It didn't work.

"Weird? Man, just wait until your brother finds his soul mate. Talk about denial or lack of realization. I mean seriously Ca-" I cut myself off mid-sentence. Shit, I wasn't supposed to say any of that. Suddenly feeling like Hagrid as I blurted out, "I shouldn't have said that!"

Sam looked like he wanted to pursue the topic, but the look of panic in my face must have stopped him. So instead he changed the conversation's direction by asking, "What about the Doctor? I was talking to him, and he's like 900 years old. He's had dozens of companions and they almost all end up getting hurt or killed in some way. Why do you trust him at all?"

I paused for a second to finish chewing on a piece of macaroni, "There's no doubt that the Doctor's dangerous. It's a sort of job description. However, you know how old he is, he gets lonely. He doesn't genuinely want to hurt anyone. I mean he took the name "Doctor," he wants quite the opposite: to fix everyone's problems. It seems like a lot of problems occur from him, but he doesn't do it intentionally. He's just sort of… unlucky. It's part of the job, you should understand. He saves the world every other day, and it's dangerous. He knows it. His companions know it. But he's willing to die for them, for this planet, or any planet for that manner. And you know the worst part? He never gets thanked, but I guess you and Dean understand that too."

"So despite traveling through the entirety of space and time, and then some, the Doctor doesn't have a life anyone should envy."

"Basically, he loses everyone, so from that point of view, yes. You shouldn't be envious of him. I mean, even at the end of this case he's going to lose the five of us, because either all of you will return to your fictional universes or you won't but you will continue your adventures without the Doctor's aid, which means he has to carry on alone once more."

"So will you, if we all go back." Sam said after a moment. The look of concern on his face was genuine; I knew Sam cared about me. Overtime, he'd probably even love me. I wasn't sure if what we had was too new, too unformed to keep him here. We had only known each other for two days anyway. He couldn't possibly feel that strongly for me in that amount of time that he would choose to stay with me over returning to his own universe.

"Yeah, that's true. I got to meet you all once, though. So I guess that's better than nothing." Inside it crushed me to think that they would leave again, but what could I do? If they left, they left. I wouldn't be able to stop it, and I didn't want them to go feeling guilty about leaving me.

"Would it be better for you if we stayed?" Sam asked looking directly into my eyes. I looked away, unable to bear the intensity of his gaze. Trapped in the beam of Sam's eyes, I knew my distress couldn't be hidden. Sam seemed to look right into the depths of my mind and understand that losing him would crush me, despite my attempt to hide it.

"Probably," I answered truthfully. There was no way for me to lie to Sam, "but it's not my call to make. You all have friends and family in your universes. I can't keep you from them." This made Sam pause in the middle of chewing on another forkful of salad.

"What if they fell through as well, but they didn't land in the center of the storm?" He asked abruptly.

I stared at him stunned. I hadn't thought of that, but could others have fallen out of the rips too? "I guess… I think it's possible."

"We'll have to make sure that it's true, before we strand anyone else in this universe."

"So… you're going to stay? After the case?" I asked barely containing my excitement and trying to hide the hopeful tone in my voice.

"Looks like we might," Sam nodded.

"Could I help?" I inquired on impulse.

"Aren't you in college?" He asked, stealing a bit of my macaroni and cheese.

"Yeah, but I only have a semester left. I could take all the courses online." I retaliated by stealing a walnut from Sam's salad.

"But you're only twenty one, how can you graduate so early?" Sam asked confused but a hint impressed.

"I got a lot of college credits in high school, so when I started college I came in basically as a second semester sophomore. I was already planning to graduate early, so I could save some money. You know, writers don't really make much." I laughed with my whole body, my black hair bouncing across my forehead. Sam's eyes followed my movements. I could see something cross Sam's face, maybe it was affection hidden inside his smile, and I knew this date was already a success.

"Oh wow, so you're, like, really smart?" Sam grinned jokingly. His brown eyes (they were more greenish before, but apparently they changed color like Sherlock's eyes did) looked affectionately at me. I stared back my green eyes meeting his. Somehow how it made sense, perfect sense that I was here with Sam, who was no longer a fictional character. That our feet were linked together under the table and our hands were only centimeters apart. It was as if I had been preparing for the moment all my life and it was finally here. Happiness and comfort, which I imagined was the same color as Sam's eyes, welled up inside my stomach at the perfection of this moment.

"I'm fairly smart." I smiled back. It felt so nice to be complimented by Sam, sort of like the warmth you feel after drinking hot chocolate. He flashed a smile filled with white teeth at me, a perfect smile if you will.

"I think you underestimate that," Sam laughed. He went to take another bite of salad when his fork screeched across the bottom of his empty dish. I chuckled and ate the last bit of my macaroni and cheese. I had been so engrossed in the conversation that I hadn't been paying attention to how much food I had left. Apparently Sam had been too.

Appearing magically, like she knew exactly when we had finished our meal, the waitress returned to take our plates and prompt us to buy something off the desert menu. We ended up picking a slice of cheesecake to share.

When that arrived about five minutes after we ordered it, Sam and I were discussing nothing in particular. At some point he had taken hold of my hand and rubbing patterns into the pad of my thumb. I could have sworn it was a protection symbol that he was drawing, but it was a little hard to tell. It felt nice and tender. I was beginning to feel sleep drunk from the food and the content I felt in his presence, and probably from the bit of alcohol as well. It was a good feeling, and for a moment I forgot about the demon and the time rips and other universes.

Sam, not wanting to let go of my hand, attempted to pick up a fork with his left hand. He nearly knocked it onto the ground in the process of grabbing it. Having successfully picked it up and gotten a piece of cheesecake on it, he pointed it at me. Teasingly he said, "Open your mouth."

I cooperated, opening my mouth while Sam tried to navigate the forkful of cheesecake into it. I admit in thought it was romantic, but in action attempting to feed someone with your non-dominant hand just ended in getting food all over the other person's face before successfully getting it into his or her mouth. Sam and I were in stitches laughing as I rubbed my face clean with a napkin.

"Well that was an interesting endeavor." I teased.

"You try it then, if it's so easy." He retorted grinning.

"Fine, I will." Taking my left hand out of Sam's grasp, I took my fork and got a bit of cheesecake on it. Smoothly I aimed the fork at Sam's opened mouth, and got the cheesecake in on my first try.

"What? How did y-" He mumbled with his mouth full, eyes widening in surprise and glinting with an emotion that I couldn't identify- attraction? Happiness?

"Tsk. Tsk. Tsk. You shouldn't talk with your mouth full Sammy." He rolled his eyes, before he finished chewing as if to say _fine mother, I won't talk until I've swallowed this mouthful._

"How did you do that?" Sam exclaimed immediately after swallowing the piece of cheesecake.

"I'm ambidextrous." I responded simply, causing Sam to laugh hysterically. I could almost see him adding this to the silly 'list of things relating to Lucy' in his shaggy head. Leaning across the table suddenly, so that his plaid shirt barely avoided a collision with the remaining bits of cheesecake, Sam pressed a soft kiss to my lips. Once I had gotten over the surprise, I kissed him back. He tasted like beer and sunbeams and something similar to allspice. I pulled away after a moment, smiling shyly.

"Public area," I answered to the question in Sam's eyes to why I had stopped.

"Oh right," Sam blushed as if he had forgotten that we were in the bar still.

"It's all good," I responded, taking his hand and planting a kiss on his palm. Maybe guys were the ones who were supposed to do all the hand kissing, but to be honest I didn't really care. I was in falling in love with Sam, and I couldn't be more delighted.

We were driving back in the Impala when I realized something was off. It was only 9 o'clock at night, but none of the windows in the neighborhood were lit up like they were normally. None of the older residents were outside on their porches knitting like they usually did. The late night runners weren't running at all.

"Sam… something's wrong." I scanned the street in front of us as if it had the answer to all the questions running through my mind.

"I can feel it too. Let's hurry up and get back to the TARDIS." He pushed down on the gas pedal, accelerating the car by 10 miles per hours. We were well over the speed limit, but there wasn't a soul around to see it.

We pulled into the driveway, and jumped out of the car immediately after Sam put it in park. He pocketed the keys as we went running into the backyard.

"It's not here." I whispered. Sam stood next to me, body still but eyes scanning the yard hoping they missed something.

"No… it's not." He concurred.

"So next question- where the hell is the TARDIS?"


	10. Chapter 10: Demons and the Color Blue

I spun around the yard, whipping my head left and right in a way that caused my short hair to slap against my face. Trees surrounded the perimeter of the yard, and a few colored leaves littered the grass like fallen stars. They crunched when I took a few steps forward to stand where the TARDIS had been when Sam and I had left for our date.

"It's not here," Sam said, staring blankly at me.

"Thank you for that brilliant deduction Captain Obvious." I retorted. Immediately I apologized, "Sorry Sam, I just, get stressed out easily."

"It's fine, Lucy," he responded kindly, his eyes scanning the yard. They fell on the house of the murder, right behind mine. "Hey, umm- do the lights work in that house?"

I glanced behind me and was startled by the blue light that was coming through the gaps between the pine trees from the abandoned house. "No, the electricity is cut off from the house, since no one has lived in it for years. I always have to bring a flash light when I visit there."

"Glowing lights in a house without electricity and a missing TARDIS… coincidence?"

"I think not." I finished for him. Sam smiled down at me, and squeezed my hand for a moment as if he was trying to reassure me.

"Let's get the supplies first, and then go see what all this is about," he gestured vaguely to the glowing lights.

"Good idea." I nodded, squeezing Sam's hand back to keep a lock on my fragile reality.

We ran back to the Impala, feet occasionally crunching leaves, which sounded like grenades in the eerie silence. Sam hastily opened the trunk, pulling out three pistols. He handed one to me, tucked one into the back of his pants, and held the other in his hand. He also grabbed a container of salt and some holy water, which he put into a duffle bag. Slinging the bag over his shoulder Sam locked eyes with me. I glanced down at the gun without saying anything.

"You don't know how to use a gun do you?"

"I know _how _to use one. I just have never held one." I defended.

"So basically you don't know how to use one?" He was already tucking his other gun into a jacket pocket.

"Basically." I held out the gun, expecting him to take it from me.

"Quick crash course then," he said instead. "Here's the magazine, it contains the bullets." The hunter pulled it out and then swiftly loaded it back into the gun. "The safety has to be off when you're using it." He clicked the safety off for me. "Pull the trigger slowly, otherwise your aim will be skewed." Sam put the safety back on and handed me the gun. I took it from him feeling a combination of power and fear. I resolved that I wouldn't shoot a bullet out of this weapon, unless it became a matter of life or death.

"Is that all I need to know?"

"Not remotely," Sam responded double-checking his gear before looking at me again. "But we don't have time to review everything now, so that will have to do. Come on."

I followed Sam across the yard, trying to avoid fallen leaves- a task easier said than done. Nearly every other step was accompanied by a crunch that echoed in the quietness of the neighborhood. Of course, Sam wasn't doing any better. His big feet seemed to find every leaf in the area. Regardless, we hurried to the line of pine trees that separated my house from the abandoned one. Sam held up his hand in a motion that meant for me to stay still as he peered around the nearest pine tree to look through one of the windows of the house, his hair just barely dangling in front of his eyes.

"They're all standing around the TARDIS. I think the Doctor is inspecting the time hole more closely." Sam whispered his breath tickling my ear.

"No sign of the demon?" I asked. I shifted slightly so I could see both the house and Sam more clearly, rustling the bed of pine needles.

"No sign of the demon." He reaffirmed.

"Let's go then," I started to walk toward the house, but Sam grabbed my shoulder accidently pressing down on the stitches. I yelped causing him instantly let go. A flicker of guilt crossed his face as he took a step back, trying to distance himself from me (possibly in fear of hurting me again). I followed him by taking a step forward. I knew Sam, and I knew that given the choice he'd never really hurt anyone. Especially the season two version of Sam, he was still moderately innocent and filled with hope for the world and his ability to do some good in it. I wasn't going to be the one who made him believe that there was a monster growing inside of him. Especially, since there wasn't, there never was, and there never will be.

"You can't go in there. Dean said it was too dangerous before." He said defensively. Touching my shoulder, must have reminded him of the injuries I had secured last time we had interacted with the demon.

"Right and last time Dean sent us back to the house where the demon did find us. That was when the house was still fairly secure. Now it would be insanely easy for a break-in. Plus it wouldn't be safe for us to inhabit, because of the glass strewn everywhere. Honestly, if we're thinking about the safest place for me to be, it would either be with all of you" I gestured vaguely to the house indicating all of the characters that had popped into my reality. "Or inside the TARDIS," I gestured to the house once more. "Or inside of the Impala driving away from here, but I think neither of us would like that option." At least, I knew I didn't, and I was hoping Sam didn't either.

Sam stood still for a moment thinking his options over. I could almost see the over-protective gears of his churning through what I had said, evaluating every aspect. He finally reached the conclusion that the house was the safest area for me to be in. He nodded his head with a jerk and led me forward with a touch on the back.

It only took a minute for us to reach the backdoor of the house. It looked like Sam was about to barge in through the door, which would probably scare everyone inside, making them point their guns at us. I stuck out my hand in front of Sam, and instead raised my fist to knock on the door five times in the "Shave and a Haircut" routine.

The low murmurs of conversation that we could hear before were silenced at my knocking. I knocked again, and Sam called out "It's us Dean. Don't shoot."

The door opened quickly after that. Dean greeted us with the oh-so-pleasant, "I wouldn't shoot you. At least, not right away."

He ushered us in and quickly closed the door, adjusting all the locks and relaying the salt line. The house looked basically the same as I had found it the morning I discovered the body of Ally Johnson, only the blood had been cleaned up. The old house creaked in welcome as I stepped into the living area where everyone else was gathered. Sherlock and the Doctor were both staring at the fireplace where the time rip was. I wouldn't have been able to see it except for the glowing light. The light traced the outline of the rip, the shape of a jagged circle as if someone had stuck a knife into the time-space continuum and tried to carve out a piece. I had been expecting to see a dark void in the middle of the circle, but it wasn't there. Instead it seemed to be invisible, because where the hole was looked the same as the space behind it, a red brick fireplace blackened with years of use by the previous owners (or at least that's what I had always assumed).

"Why is it glowing?" I asked. "It wasn't glowing earlier."

"I'm not quite sure…" The Doctor answered thoughtfully, pushing his glasses back into place on the bridge of his nose. "Perhaps Mother Nature is mending it up on her own. It happens like that sometimes. The pieces of time that caused the rip can shift back in place and close it."

"The time rip had stretched the house out, and now it's beginning to set back in its more natural state. So by all means, I would say the Doctor is right on track with thinking the rip is knitting it's self closed." Sherlock added.

"What do you mean the housed was stretched out?" Dean asked, turning his head to look around the room probably seeing nothing different.

"Ugh, you all see so little. Just look! Open your eyes! It couldn't possibly be that hard." The detective emphasized this with massive hand gestures.

"Sherlock…" came a warning from the back of the room. Sherlock took one look at John and shut his mouth before insulting anyone else. Instead he looked around the room, reaffirming his earlier conclusion.

"The fireplace" Sherlock pointed his coat whipping around his calves, "is not as rectangular as it was last time we investigated here. It's becoming squarer, which seems to be the natural shape going by the layout of the bricks and the size they're normally constructed. The curtains on the windows are touching the floor now. They were three inches off the ground yesterday. And most interestingly," Sherlock paused for dramatic effect. I could almost hear John roll his eyes at the detective's enjoyment of having us all at the edge of our seats. "The house is creaking. It wasn't creaking earlier, which I had thought strange at the time. A house this old, and unlived it for such a long time? Of course it should creak. So house settling back into shape, time rip appearing to be closing, it all seems to add up."

A collective "oh" breathed around the room, as we all processed the man's deductions. Not that I ever had any doubt, but Sherlock really was a proper genius. It was amazing to see his brain work. In the silence we heard a creak coming from roughly the other side of the house.

"You see?" Sherlock declared. "The house is settling back into place."

Another creaked followed a second later, then a moment passed and one more creak. What was creaking over there? I basically had the house memorized I knew where it liked to creak, and which boards remained in stubborn silence. I mentally scanned the house, the dining room was over that way as well as the front door. Another, softer creak echoed through the house. The basement door was over on that side of the house as well. The stairs to the basement were very noisy. The few times I've ventured to the basement it sounded like a chorus of singing frogs following me down the staircase. Put together with the pauses in between each creak we heard, it had to be the staircase.

"I don't think that's the house, Sherlock." I whispered slowly. "Listen to the pattern of the creaks." Everyone stopped breathing waiting for another creak. There were two more in the next few seconds. "Someone's on the basement stairs." Five pairs of eyes turned to look at me.

"Y' all stay put. We'll go check it out." Dean pulled his gun from the back of his jeans as did Sam. He handed that gun to John and took the other one from out of his jacket pocket.

"Stay inside the salt lines," Sam encouraged everyone, but his eyes were locked directly on mine. I nodded solemnly, and Sam turned away, following Dean to the other side of the house.

"I'll take your gun Lucy, if you don't mind." Sherlock stated holding his hand out. I wordlessly handed over the weapon.

"Thank you." He glanced at John, nodding his head. The two of them split off to opposite sides of the room, one at each entrance.

I looked up at the Doctor, wondering if we should be doing anything.

"Come over here, Lucy. We might as well prepare to make a hasty exit." The Doctor lightly touched my back, leading me over to the TARDIS door. I froze outside the door at the sound of gunfire and the thud of a body.

"That was someone being pushed against the wall. The timing would have been closer between the shots and the body dropping." I heard Sherlock mutter partially to himself, partially to Watson

"It's the demon then?" John answered, raising an eyebrow at Sherlock.

Sherlock nodded gravely and repositioned his gun, scanned the area around the door with a sharp eye. _Sam._ I thought worriedly, but he was a hunter. He could handle himself, and it wasn't like he was alone… Somehow none of these thoughts pacified my whirring brain as I worried that Sam might get hurt.

"We should really get in the TARDIS," the Doctor prompted. His hand was still on my back, leading me inside the police box.

"No," I breathed out so quietly I could barely hear it. The tension in the room was tangible, unbearably so.

"What?" The Doctor leaned closer to me. His coat brushed against my leg and he was bent over a few inches, so there was no height difference between us.

"No," I said more strongly this time, staring the Doctor in the eye. "We faced a demon earlier. That was the future version, now we're facing the past version. You heard the demon yesterday, it was here to get revenge on _me._ If I'm not in this fight, if I don't push that demon into that time rip, then the time stream will be changed."

Our eyes stared for a while longer, my green ones like lasers boring into the comfortable brown of the Doctor's eyes. I knew I was right, and I think the Doctor knew it too, but he was racking his brain for there to be another way to do this that involved keeping me out of danger. There wasn't. Finally, the Doctor relented and dropped his gaze, "you're right."

"I know," I responded gravely.

From the other side of the house we could hear some shuffling, but whatever was happening it seemed to be making its way over to us. John and Sherlock shifted their stances, so they were even more straight- backed and ready to join the fight.

"Try to stay out of the fighting at least," the Doctor pleaded. He placed both his hands lightly on my shoulder as to not hurt me, but his face was the only thing in my vision.

"I'll try my best." I responded. It wasn't like I had any type of weapon to aid me in fighting. If it came down to it, if I fought it would have to hand to hand combat. I could handle that, stitches or not. That's what Sam would do, right?

"They're coming!" Sherlock called out. I could hear the fighting getting closer.

"If you have to shoot, don't kill." I instructed Sherlock and Watson. "The demon is still inside Mr. Eddie, and I'd rather not have him dead. Plus bullets won't impede the demon in general. Shoot as a distraction, not a solution."

"Yes ma'am" John responded immediately. My brain, being what it is, immediately wished that we were in Star Trek and I could say "Set your phasers to stun" instead of "don't shoot."

"They're coming around the corner, get ready." Sherlock said steadily, his eyes focused on the hallway. John's shoulder brushed the detective's, as he stood next to him in the door frame. Both guns were trained on the empty hallway. The Doctor and I raced from the target to the opening of the time rip.

Just as we were approaching the rip, it started to quake as if it were made of Jello. The Doctor and I both stopped in our tracks, watching the circle shift. Little by little we could see something taking form until there was a six-foot tall man staring us in the face. He smirked, the right side of his mouth curling into an unpleasant smile.

"Looks like we were just in time for the party," he said threateningly as his eyes turned black.

"Hey John!" I called out in behind us in his direction. "We've got a demon infestation in the time hole!"

"Then close the damn time hole!" He responded immediately. I could hear his gun firing behind us. He must be focused on the main demon, doing damage without killing the vessel.

"There's more coming," The Doctor spoke his eyes widening. Grabbing my wrist, he pulled me a few steps toward the TARDIS doorway. "Quick! Get in!"

"No, I'm not deserting everybody else!" I retorted nearly yelling."I've already explained why."

"We're not deserting anyone. Just trust me." The Time Lord pulled me inside, before I had another chance to respond. He shut the door quickly behind us. "We refilled your water guns with holy water while you and Sam were on your date. Also, hula-hoops!" The Doctor held up a pink hula-hood grinning like a five-year-old child.

"Hula-hoops?" I questioned, picking up the one closest to me. They were the type of hula-hoop you could hear stuff shifting around the hollow inside of the hoop.

"They're filled with salt. It was my idea. Demons shouldn't be able to get out of these circles at least as far as Dean explained. We'll see if they work or not." The Doctor grabbed a squirt gun and a few hula-hoops and gestured for me to do likewise.

We ran out of the TARDIS, already shooting the water. We had only been out of the fight for a minute or two at most, but the time rip was placing demon after demon into the room. Already, in addition to Mr. Eddie, there were nine demons in the room. John and Sherlock were trying to avoid killing any of the demons, but Sam and Dean were now aiming for kill shoots on all of the demon coming through the time rip, even though it didn't impede them much at all.

Giving a war cry, the Doctor and I sprayed all the demons in range. The Time Lord was the first to try out a hula-hoop. He managed to throw it so it landed around one demon. However, the demon just stepped over the hoop as if it was nothing.

"The salt is covered by plastic," I stated to the Doctor, aiming my water gun at another target. "I was wondering if they would affect the results, and apparently it does. Since the demon doesn't fear direct contact with the salt, it doesn't affect them much at all."

"Ahh well, it was worth a try." The Doctor dropped the hula-hoops, and I followed suit.

"You don't happen to have any extra holy water do you?" I asked. My gun was starting to feel light, and the spray was coming out more in spurts instead of one continuous stream.

"No." He responded through clenched teeth. His gun was still working, but he was also being more precise with his shots.

_We need to tie this up quickly_, I thought. More demons were pooling through the open time rip. The demon in Mr. Eddie must have summoned them to aid him in the fight, or maybe he was planning a take-over in the town. I didn't know, but it didn't matter, because we had to deal with all the demons whatever the original motive was.

My gun finally ran out of water, and I set it down on the ground. _I needed to do something._ _We needed to… EXORISE THE DEMONS!_ For whatever reason I hadn't thought of that previously, but exorcising the demons was exactly what we had to do. I was just going to blame the lack of intelligent thought on the adrenaline rush… and perhaps the attack demons as well.

The Doctor was only a few inches in front of me, so I leaned over and whispered into his ear, "Cover me, okay?" He looked up at me quickly and nodded. Training his eyes back on the demons coming at us, I turned so we were back to back.

"Exorcizamus te, omnid immundus spiritus, omnis satanica," I was yelling loudly, hoping that a stronger voice would be more effective at exorcizing demons. I didn't know if it was more effective or not, but yelling does draw attention to oneself. "Potestas, omnis incursio infenalis adversarii, "as I could continue any further, there was already a flock of ten demons descending on the Doctor and me.

Little droplets of holy water, sprayed my face as the Doctor shot water at anyone in range. However, I had nothing to fight with and half a dozen demons approaching.

"omnis congregation et secta diabolica" the closest demon was on top of me in a second. His fingers were deformed claws, which stung like hell as the lesser demon clawed at my face. He was screaming from the incantation. I raised my leg in a swift upward kick in defense. The demon paused for a moment, but went almost immediately back to scratching me. Apparently, demons don't have feelings in their genitals, or at least they divert the pain to the vessel, in which case I apologized silently to the vessel.

Switching tactics, I pushed the demon back with a front kick to the solar plexus. I had enough time to slip out of reach of the demon before it regained its balance. "ergo, draco maledicte…" However, the room was filling up quickly with bodies, so evading one demon wasn't enough. Almost instantly there was another demon, which had taken hold of my arms from behind my back. I stepped forward and twisted to the right hoping to disorient the demon enough, so that she'd loosen her grip. She just stepped in time with me, which didn't help me at all. I could flip her over my back, but there was a strong likelihood that I would follow her down. The very _last_ thing I wanted to do was end up on my back surrounded on all sides by demons. I wished for a moment that I had a weapon. Not even a gun, a pair of nun-chucks would be fine. Heck, at this moment, I could make do with a walking stick, but there was nothing in range for me to use as a makeshift staff.

"Ecclesiam tuam securi," I was out of breath. The demons within a small radius of me all started to scream. "tibi facias" I panted for breath. "libertate servire" I felt like my mouth had been stuffed with cotton balls, and one look to the left of me confirmed that the demon possessing Mr. Eddie now had his focus on me. Damn, I had been so close to finishing it.

"That was a valiant effort young one, but you're not going to get very far here." I glanced over my shoulder, wondering if anyone could see what was going on. However, so many demons had already poured through the time rip that I could barely see any of my friends and of what I could see, everyone was surrounded and fighting. But, dear lord, we were out numbered.

"Now, you are by far being the biggest nuisance to my troops, trying to exorcise them. I certainly can't have that, now can I?" The demon paused, adjusting a metal ring on his right finger. My lovable neighbor wasn't married, though, and he never wore rings. "I do think I have a use for you, though, dear. You see I have this pet," he paused for a moment as a terrible screech tore through the rip, "and he's always hungry. He's got a real thing for human flesh. I don't know why. You humans are filthy, disgusting creatures. I wouldn't want you anywhere near my mouth, but monsters have their preferences. And who am I to judge?!" His smirk grew wide as he sensed the monster flying through the rip. I realized then that the ring matched the metal of the feathers on the bird, the demon must be using it to control the bird. I hadn't noticed it during out previous fight, although, I had been a little preoccupied at the time.

"Go on Stymphie, dear, it's feeding time." The demon in Mr. Eddie directed. In one moment, before I could barely react, I saw the bird fly above Mr. Eddie and dive straight at me, the lesser demon that was holding me quickly let go of my arms and jumped out of the way. I was only just able to throw myself to the ground before the monster shish-kabobbed me. The bird had still gotten a little piece, as it had flown past. My right side was searing in pain, and I was losing a lot of blood. There was no time to treat it now. I would deal with it later… if there was a later. I pushed that thought aside. Damn, it was getting hard to focus for some reason. _Oh blood loss, right. That could be it. _

"This better fucking work," I muttered to myself. Willing my protesting body off the ground, the lesser demons around us weren't reacting to me as they waited for Mr. Eddie to react, I took one staggering step toward the demon then another. I could feel the bird behind me, swiftly approaching. With a prayer to God or any power that would listen, I leaped forward pushing Mr. Eddie. I belly flopped to on the hardwood floor, knocking the wind out of myself. Mr. Eddie staggered back from the force of my push. It wasn't enough to fall over; nevertheless, it was enough to get him off balance. The monster bird that had been heading toward me, plowed into Mr. Eddie instead, lowering its beak just in time to avoid stabbing his master. The force from the bird's flight combined with my push was enough to knock the two of them backward, a few stumbling steps into the time rip.

As soon as the demon and the bird were dead, the glowing outline of the rip started to close in on itself. The hole knitted its edges back together, until it looked like nothing had ever been there at all. A few of the demons that were close to where the hole had been felt around with their hands to no avail. There was no longer a direct connection between the future and the past. I smiled to myself, the worst of this was over.

Of course, I was stupendously wrong. As soon as their commander left, the lesser demons pounced on me at once. I was too exhausted to move. I couldn't remember the exorcism. Everyone else was busy fighting their own foes, and even if they noticed it was be too late for any of them to help. I was going to die. As I resigned myself to this fact (the second time in the past few days), I remembered one thought Sam has shared during our date. _"What _i_f they fell through as well, but they didn't land in the center of the storm."_ He had said this in reference to the secondary characters in all these shows… maybe. Maybe he could be right?

I figured I had nothing to lose as I breathed out a prayer. "Castiel," I could feel the footsteps of the demons vibrating through the floorboards as they raced closer. "I need your help. I'm about to die, there are demons and I can't fight them. Please. Please Cas, please." I closed my eyes, surprised to find tears in them.

I heard the faint whoosh of wings. Half thinking I imagined it, I kept my head on the floor. As soon as I saw bodies start to drop beside me in small flashes of light that could only be Castiel's angel mojo, I lifted up my head enough to see the edge of his trench coat. I moaned at the effort it took to move any body part. Letting my head thump back to the floor, I slowly moved my hand to the side, hoping to stem the flow of blood. I should have considered doing that earlier, but I hadn't been thinking straight. My hand connected with a warm, wetness covering the side of my body. I pressed down, but it hurt worse than when I was shot (it was just a graze, but still it counts). I hissed and let up on the pressure.

Then I felt another hand on top of mine and a warm glow suffusing through me, like the feeling of relief and the smoothness of honey tea healing sore throat. Soon his hands moved to my shoulders then my arm. All of the pain had left my body, and I felt light and healed as if I could go run a marathon instantly.

"I've healed you as best I can, Lucy. Rest now. I'll make certain that no demons threaten you." And with that my eyelids fluttered shut on their own accord. The last image of Cas's clear blue eyes burned on my irises as my mind slipped into the comforting darkness of sleep and recovery.


	11. Chapter 11: Impending Decisions

"Ughhh" I groaned, opening my eyes. A bright light and a face swam in front of my vision, causing me to shut my eyes again.

"She's awake guys!" Someone called. I kept my eyes closed, gathering the state I was in without using them. My whole body was sore as if I'd been used as a punching bag, but there were no sharp pains. Castiel must have done a solid job healing me.

"Hey, Lucy, how are you feeling?" There was a person squatting beside me, smoothing the hair on my forehead.

I opened my eyes more slowly this time, allowing them to take in the brightness of… wherever I was. I tilted my head upwards a little to find Sam above me. It took another moment for my brain to process that he'd asked me a question, and one more moment to formulate a response. "Groggy, but nothing hurts anymore."

I pushed myself up with my arms and, upon finding that my body didn't protest, decided to stand. I rose to my feet and took in the surroundings. Curved walls, metal grate floor- I was back in the TARDIS. It looked like cross between a celebration and an intense conversation between everyone in here. What drew my attention was Dean and Cas. Dean was holding a half-drunken beer and hovering near Castiel, who seemed to be the center of attention. At least until I had woken up.

The soles of my boots clicked, echoing through the abruptly silent TARDIS, as I walked over to Castiel, passing by Dean and an empty beer bottle on the floor. I doubted Sam would have had a drink while I was out, so Dean must be on his second. If they ended up staying in my universe, I was going to nip Dean's drinking habit in the bud before it got out of hand. Standing in front of Castiel was intimidating. I had always pictured him as a short, adorable assbutt, which was entirely not the case. Cas was taller than me by nearly a head. While not quite muscular as the Winchesters (though he would probably look similar to Dean if his clothes fit better), Cas wasn't scrawny either. He had the body of a triathlon competitor: a runner's and biker's legs (as least from what I could tell) and a swimmer's shoulders. I could imagine that he had a steady hand just as a natural trait from being an angel. However, in his trench coat standing next to everyone else, he looked confused. Of course he hid it fairly well, but I could tell that he just wanted someone (probably Dean, because he kept glancing over at the hunter) to explain what was going on.

Cas shifted slightly under my stare to glance at Dean, who wasn't paying attention at the moment. He looked back at me, meeting my stare with intense focus. My blank face broke into a smile as I pulled the angel into a tight hug. Cas stood still for a moment, not sure how to respond, before awkwardly returning the embrace.

"Thank you Castiel. You save my life." I whispered into his ear, so that only he could hear me.

"It was… no problem." He responded in a gruff voice. I pulled back from the hug and watched as Cas looked over at Dean for the third time in a minute. "Why isn't he talking to me, Lucy? Did I do something wrong?"

I peeked at Dean, who was watching Cas with a suspicious eye. "He hasn't met you yet." Castiel must have been pulled from a later period in the show, meaning that he knew Dean but Dean didn't know him. My heart sank for the angel as I realized all those implications.

"That would explain why he plunged a knife into my chest." Castiel stated, looking down at his chest where his heart was or rather where Jimmy Novak's heart was. I'm not entirely certain if angels have hearts, because they were in essence a bright light, and lights don't really need organs.

"That would probably explain it." I pulled Cas in for another hug, but just a quick one this time. One to imply my sympathy and sorrow for the situation he's been placed. "I'm sorry Castiel, but whatever you and Dean had" (I hoped that I was reading his emotions right) "you can get it back. It just might take some time. But this is a new place, so maybe it will turn out even better?"

"But I'll know parts of his fate that he hasn't experienced for himself yet. It would be dangerous to interact with him. I might inform him of an event that hasn't taken place. It could alter the future."

"Trust me Cas," I said with a little laugh. "I know exactly how you feel." The angel tilted his head and squinted at me.

"Come on. Let's sit you down and explain the situation." I tugged on Castiel's elbow leading him to the middle of the room. I caught Sam's eye and motioned for him to come over. John and Sherlock saw us congregating from across the room and walked over to join the conversation. Soon enough the seven of us were all sitting in a circle on the floor of the TARDIS. I was between Castiel and Sam. Dean was on the other side of Cas. He kept glancing at the angel. Their knees kept brushing against each other, I couldn't tell if it was intentional on their of their parts, but it gave me hope that they could regain the bond they had lost. John and Sherlock were sitting together, John next to Sam and Sherlock next to the Doctor. I took a moment just to smile broadly. All of these characters I had looked up to, they were my friends now. How much more blessed could I be?

"Right so first thing first. We should explain what's going to Castiel here." I started, throwing a friendly arm over Cas's shoulder.

"No, I think we should talk about who, _what,_ Cas is. I stabbed him with a knife… to the heart! And all he did was look down in surprise." I stared blankly hunter, thinking, _Oh Dean, use your head, I've been alluding to Cas on and off since we met. I've mentioned his name once in conversation already, and twice I called him your little angel._

"Fair enough. Do you want to introduce yourself Cas?" I looked at the angel. His eyes were wide as he stared at us all. I wondered if he could already tell what a strange group this was by his angel mojo.

"Hello," he said slowly. "I am Castiel, and I am an angel of the Lord."

We all looked toward him, expecting him to continue. But Cas fell silent and continued to watch us, trying to gage a reaction.

"Right," I said after a moment. Giving the angel a little pat on the shoulder, I whispered, "Good job, Cas." Mentally, I gathered all the information I knew about him and shifted through it for the relevant bits. "Cas is from the same show as Sam and Dean. As he said, he's an angel of the Lord, so he's really powerful. He's… one of the good guys." I finished lamely.

"How could you be an angel? Angels don't exist." Sherlock scoffed immediately, looking at Cas. I wished I could look into his head, and see all the deductions he was coming up with.

"And two days ago, you said aliens and ghosts weren't real either," the Doctor retorted with a grin. He was leaning back on his hands, lifting one occasionally the push his glasses back up the bridge of his nose.

"True…" The baritone voice droned. Personally, I was surprise Sherlock hadn't exploded at all. His personality demanded facts and consistencies. Aliens, ghosts, and now angels? They were outside of his realm of the ordinary world. My guess was that he had categorized this universe in its own bubble that had both normal human relations and odd occurrences that happened, which just unmistakably fit into place with the natural order of things.

"Being an angel would explain how you smote all those demons and healed Lucy," Sam added, looking at Cas. I could see the gratefulness in the hunter's eyes, and it made me blush just a bit.

"Right, so now we all know about you, more or less, but you know nothing about us." I started, shifting how I was seated, so I was directly facing Cas. Coincidently, my back was pressing against Sam's leg…. But it was a complete accident. Not like I was _actively_ trying to touch Sam. No, of course not.

"I know more than you give me credit for, Lucy." Castiel interrupted.

"Okay then, tell us what you know." I prompted, now leaning against Sam's shoulder. He didn't seem to mind, though.

"You're name is Lucy Peverall. They are Sam and Dean Winchester, I know them well." Castiel paused a moment here as he glanced at Dean, hoping to see some sort of recognition in his face. If anything, though, Dean only looked more confused as he stared back at the angel with large green eyes. I could see Cas's face crumble as he turned back to me. _Do angels have hearts?_ I wondered again. One look at those blue eyes, and I realized, _They must, because Cas's was breaking. _He took another look around the circle, naming each person in turn, "The Doctor, although your real name is hidden somewhere beyond what I can see." The Doctor, nodded not questioning how Cas knew.

"John Hamish Watson, both a soldier and a doctor. You've been braver than some of the angels I know." John straightened his back and smiled a little while thanking the angel.

"And Sherlock Holmes, a man who is prideful and arrogant, who believes himself better than everyone else, yet ought to be grateful to have a friend steady and humble enough to support the both of you." Sherlock glanced quickly at John then back at Castiel. I saw his eyes flicker to Dean momentarily, obviously putting it all together.

"I am a very lucky man to have John Watson as a friend," Sherlock replied. Normally, he would have thrown an insult, but the detective must have identified Cas as an equal. Someone who could see all the ties in humanity that no one else could, and felt the same way as Sherlock did. Only he was quieter about it.

"I know Sam and Dean, but the rest of you are not familiar. There's something… different about you all." He tilted his head, squinting his eyes as he examined all of us again. Really, it was a pain to reign in my fangirling sometimes.

"That's where I'll do some explaining then," I jumped back into the conversation. Sam's shoulder was still supporting my back, but I really didn't feel like moving, so I just stayed as I was sitting as Cas turned his gaze back to me.

"We're from different universes. There was a time rip in my universe. It was naturally occurring, but apparently it just got stretched really thin pulling you all through. Everyone here, besides myself, are from television shows that I watch. You, Sam, and Dean are from Supernatural. John and Sherlock are from a show named Sherlock. And the Doctor is from Doctor Who. As far as we can figure you all were pulled from your universes into mine. None of us really know how exactly, or if it can be reversed." I paused a second, wondering if anyone else had thought ahead to this point already. "I'm not sure if it can be reversed or not, but I saw the time rip, knit itself back together after the demon possessing Mr. Eddie went through it. That leads me to think that maybe it can't be, but the Doctor will be able to figure that out better than I can." The Doctor nodded from where he was sitting, twiddling with this sonic screwdriver. "Furthermore, as much as I'm thrilled to meet you Cas, your appearance does bring other worries to mind. I don't think you would have heard me if you were still in your universe. That means you must have slipped through, the rip as well, but… not in the center of the storm." Sam shifted in understanding of what I said, because he had wondered that out loud not more than two or three hours ago. "No offense Cas, but you aren't a main character in Supernatural. You're about as close to being a main character as you can get, and although you will be soon, you aren't one yet," season nine was premiering… twelve days? Jeez, I had nearly lost count of the days with all of this excitement. "That means that not only did the main characters get sucked into my reality, but probably all the secondary characters and the villains did too."

"Mrs. Hudson? Molly? …Moriarty?" John asked his eyes wide.

"I think so," I replied, nodding solemnly. There was a collective pause as everyone realized the magnitude of this situation. If I was right, and I was truly hoping I was wrong, then my reality would be under seige by not only demons, but also a consulting criminal, possibly the Master, Daleks, Cybermen, angels, Lucifer, and others. It would be impossible to know, who slipped through. And even more impossible to get them all back into their respective universes.

"We're going to have to stay in your reality, aren't we?" Sam finally asked over the weight of the silence and thoughts.

"At least until, we track everyone down." I replied, not daring to hope they would stay permanently.

"Actually" the Doctor piped up, running a hand nervously through his hair. "The rip has already closed, meaning the surrounding space-time fabric has returned to its normal shape. It would be difficult to get back to our own universes now, let alone tomorrow. If we have to go find everyone we've ever possibly known, there will be no chance to get back."

"So we've got to pick one or the other?" Dean asked in a gravelly voice.

"Basically, yes. We have to pick one or the other."


	12. Chapter 12: Sandwiches and Holding Hands

"How long do we have to decide?" Sherlock asked. Always logical that one, while everyone else was busy being emotionally conflicted, Sherlock was getting all the data he could before making a decision.

"About two or three hours," the Doctor responded.

"Here, I'll leave you three to discuss this among yourselves." I said to Sam, Dean, and Castiel. I pushed myself up from the sitting position I had been in and walked over to the Doctor, who was off to the side while everyone else conversed.

"What are you going to do? Stay or go?" I asked as I joined him.

"I don't know yet. I have an earth of my own that constantly needs to be saved…" He trailed off, his eyes becoming unfocused.

"…But?" I prompted him.

"But, if there are people who I know that got trapped here, I've got to save them. Plus, if any of the daleks, cybermen, weeping angels, or who knows what came through, then your earth is going to need a lot of protecting." He crossed his arms and chewed the inside of his cheek. "It's a tough decision."

"I wouldn't know." I shrugged mimicking the Doctor's pose, but while leaning against the edge of the consol.

"Of course you do, because you could come through with one of us. Pick a reality and then leave yours." He turned to me, looking to gage my reaction. Needless to say, I was speechless. I hadn't thought of leaving my reality, but here was my chance. I could finally go on adventures. I didn't need to be tied down by schoolwork (even though I did love college), or an attempt to have a social life, or even be bored with the mundane fashion I lived my life.

"I wouldn't be able to pick one." I argued. But as soon as the words were out of my mouth I knew I was wrong.

"Yes, you could." The Doctor looked pointedly at Sam. I followed his gaze to stare at the hunter as well. Even sitting down, he was taller than both Dean and Castiel. At the moment he was carefully listening to something Dean was explaining. His face was set in concern as he glanced behind his shoulder to get a quick look at me. He caught me already looking at him and smiled warmly in a way that made my heart melt just a bit.

"Your right, I would pick Sam. I'd pick him every time." I said aloud more to myself than to the Doctor. He nodded in my peripheral vision.

"I don't think you'll have to make that choice, though. Everyone here… they're all heroes. These people would give their lives for each other and for their closest friends. With Castiel's return, it seems likely that others have gotten through as well, and these people won't be able to return knowing there is a chance they're leaving a friend behind." The Time Lord was looking at Team Free Will and the residents of 221B Baker Street huddled together, discussing a question they already knew the answer to, but were too scared to admit it.

"So you think everyone will stay?" I asked, trying not to get my hope up. I mean, even if they stayed they might not want me around and condemn me to stay with my parents and live my own life. My heart clenched at that thought, imagining them all out in the world but leaving me behind. I don't think I would deal with that any better than I'd deal with them leaving for good.

"Yeah, I do. I know I will. I can't leave in the off chance that one of my companions past or future fell through the rip." I nodded, figuring that would be his response. I wondered if he was thinking specifically of Rose when he said that or all of his companions in general. We both fell into our own thoughts while the others murmured in the background.

What If Sam did stay? What would I do? Would I travel with the Winchesters and Castiel? The four of us would all be crowded in the Impala, hunting demons and monsters. It wouldn't be a bad life. Sure, it would be dangerous, but that's what I wanted, wasn't it? My thought processed stunned taking all of this in. It _would_ be dangerous. It wouldn't just be a show that tore my heart out as I watched from under blankets with a mug of hot chocolate. It would be real. My occupation as a full time fangirl and college student would be put on hold. My whole life would be put on hold- no, more than that. My life would change more dramatically than I could ever imagine. I would have to kill the people. Could I actually kill people? I don't think I'd want to kill anyone. I closed my eyes and let out a slow breathe. A hand touched my shoulder firmly as if its owner knew exactly what was going through my head.

"It's okay to be uncertain, Lucy. This is just a big of a change in your life as it is for everyone else here." The Doctor said soothingly. He gave my shoulder a little pat, before switching topics. "Now we have the curious case of Mr. Eddie, who is still in one of my guest rooms."

"Mr. Eddie!" I felt horrible, in all of the excitement I had forgotten that he was still recovering in the TARDIS. "How is he?"

"He's been sleeping the last few times I checked on him, but he's probably awake now. If he's doing okay, which he should be, then we can return him home." The Doctor said with a smile. Taking me elbow, he led me down the hall excitedly to bring me to my beloved neighbor. His room wasn't as far down the hallway as mine had been, but it still took us a minute or two to reach it.

While my room had a warm wood door, the door to my neighbor's room looked exactly like his front door, down to the white paint that was just beginning to peel and that outrageous purple door knob. The Doctor gestured for me to knock, which I did ever so slightly as to not disturb him if he were sleeping.

"Come in!" Came the mumbled response from behind the door. I eased it opened to find Mr. Eddie sitting in a comfortable armchair and smiling when he discovered who had been knocking. "Oh, hello, it's good to see you, Lucy. Now, do you mind telling me where we are?"

"The TARDIS." I said weakly. What else could I say though? This room didn't look like anything you'd find in a hospital, nursing home, motel, or anywhere;, especially, when the door was taken into account.

"TARDIS… wait isn't that on the show you watch? Doctor Who?"

"Yeah, it is." I glanced behind me, but the Doctor wasn't there. The idiot was probably planning a fancy reveal for himself.

"But…. That's fictional." He asserted looking me in the eyes, trying to will some sense into the situation.

"Wellll….." The Doctor interjected. My neighbor's eyebrows shot up so much they were almost hidden in his receding hairline. The Doctor smirked slightly, but hid it quickly. So he had been looking to make a dramatic entrance. I almost wanted to laugh at how much he acted like a little kid sometimes. "Technically, it _was_ fictional. Some… wibbly wobbly… timey whimey stuff happened, and now it's not fictional and neither am I, nor are Sam, Dean, Castiel, Sherlock, John or the demon that possessed you."

"But… you're fictional." Mr. Eddie looked at me with pleading eyes, begging me to explain what was going on.

"There was this time rip, which is a totally natural occurrence." I started explaining as the Doctor nodded along. "But something weird happened. It must have started with the demon that possessed you. Somehow he got through, which then created a rip for all these guys to fall through as well. We fixed everything by sending the demon back to hell and all, but my house was wrecked in the process…" I trailed off, realizing for the first time that I won't be able to go back home until everything was fixed. I guess I would have to stay with Mr. Eddie, or maybe I could go with Sam and Dean, or the Doctor, or even John and Sherlock. They'd take good care of me, and my parents wouldn't mind. They're always saying that I need to develop a life of my own instead of sitting around the house all day focused on work and school and things that are very small parts of the entirety of human life. I should probably call them….

"Oh sweetheart, are you okay?" Mr. Eddie asked. That was the trait I loved about him. Some serious shit could be going down in his life, but he was always going to put other people first.

"A little banged up, but I'm alright." I paused. "You were the one who got possessed! I should be asking how you're doing."

"I'm doing just fine. I'd like to go home, though. Is that possible? Or are we in the middle of the time vortex right now?"

"No we aren't in a time vortex… I thought you didn't know the shows?" The Doctor asked, making a face. I think it was his confused face, but it looked like he was trying to take a bad selfie.

"Oh, I've watched bits and pieces. Plus, Lucy talks about them all the time. The only one I haven't seen is that Supernatural show."

"Which is why you didn't recognize Sam earlier," The Doctor interjected.

My neighbor looked at down at the floor, trying to remember. "Oh! That boy with you the other day was that one of the Supernatural people?"

"He was Sam Winchester." I nodded withholding a smile.

"You too looked nice together, are you…?" Mr. Eddie was one of those people who loved happy endings and relationships. He's given me advice for few relationships I've been in already.

"Yeah, we are." I smiled tentatively.

"Well, that's just wonderful!" He pulled into a hug, which I returned happily.

"Now, Mr. Eddie we should probably get you home." I suggested.

"It's certainly nice to be home."Mr. Eddie sighed as he settled down in the brown, well-used leather chair in his living room.

"Are you sure you're okay?" I asked him. He'd been so calm about everything, never really questioning how the fictional characters got through and what happened while he was possessed.

"No." He replied as he picked up the nearest book, "but I'll realize soon enough that this probably isn't a dream. Dreams make more sense than this does. However, strange things happen all the time, and if you're certain that these characters just… fell through a time rip, then I'll believe you. I don't have a better explanation to explain everything. Plus being possessed would explain why I feel like complete and utter crap right now." He still sounded skeptical, and if anyone besides me had told him this, he'd already be calling the nearest mental institution.

"Alright then… If you need anything, even just to talk and sort things out in your head call my cell phone, okay?" I asked, standing near the arm of his chair.

"Of course I will. You know me, I'll take every opportunity to talk to you. I don't make very good company for myself" He trailed off. "Right now, I'm tired. I think reading will help, and I'll call you later when my head is processing information faster."

"That sounds like a good plan." I agreed.

"Right, if I'm not mistaken you have other business to attend to. I'll take to you soon." He flipped the book open to a dog-eared page. I took it as our signal to depart. Leading the Doctor out the door, I glanced back at my neighbor.

"Bye Mr. Eddie! I'll talk to you real soon." I waved, walking toward the exit.

"Nice meeting you, Sir!" The Doctor said as he followed me.

"And you too, Doctor. Feel free to stop in at any time, if you want some company or if you're feeling a little lonely." Mr. Eddie replied, turning to look the Doctor as he said all this.

"Then you're certain to see me again," the Time Lord replied with a crooked smile.

"Time's almost up, have you all made you decisions?" The Doctor announced as he walked back into the TARDIS with me on his tail.

He was met with several blank faces, trying to decide if their decision was the best one. The Time Lord stuck his hands in the pockets of his suit, pushing his coat out of the way as he did so. He straightened his back, and watched the five other fictional characters.

"I for one will be staying. I'd rather not leave my companions stranded in another dimension." The Doctor finally said, judging that everyone wanted to hear his decision before they voiced theirs.

"We're staying as well," Sherlock announced. John stood with his arms crossed next to him. The two of them looked firm in their decision. "There's a potential that a certain individual crossed through the rip as well, and if he did, I would be the only one who can stop him."

"What makes you think that?" Dean asked slightly offended. "I'm sure we could take him! Besides he's only human, right? Demons are clever sons of bitches _and_ they have superpowers, and we handle them all the time!"

"You don't know James Moriarty, Dean." Sherlock replied staring directly into Dean's eyes, willing him to challenge his knowledge. "He's a spider. He has people everywhere, people who are loyal to him."

"We were tracking him in London when we were pulled here." John added. "He's used humans as… playthings, strapping them to bombs to put more pressure on Sherlock to solve his little puzzles."

"Going by the people who have already fallen through, it seems that the most powerful characters are the most likely to come through. Moriarty is very powerful, so there's a higher chance that he's here than still in our reality." Sherlock concluded with a nod. Everyone remained silent for a moment, trying to process how much of a threat James Moriarty was and if they had to worry about him.

Besides Sherlock and John (and maybe Castiel, because who knows all the information he has stored in his brain), I was the only one who knew of Moriarty. And the thought of him coming here was not a pleasant one, but I trusted Sherlock's judgment. If the detective thought he was here, then he probably was.

"What about you?" The Doctor asked turning to the Supernatural crew.

"We will be staying," Cas answered for them. "There is work for us to do here as well."

At the angel's answer, I turned to Sam. He was grinning widely at me, which I recipracated immediately. Sam was staying. He was staying. We could actually be together. I was just about ready to jump about in excitement.

"We have to find our friends as well. Bobby, Jo, Ellen, and there are others out there as well." Dean added gruffly.

"Everyone is staying then?" The Doctor asked. Everyone nodded. "Fantastic! I assume we're all be going our separate ways, soon enough. Does anyone want to grab some lunch?"

_Vwoorp. Vwoorp. Vwoorp. _

The TARDIS landed back in the alleyway where it had first appeared only days earlier. Although, with everything we had been through, it felt like so much longer ago. Everyone looked around, simultaneously realizing that this would be the last time we were all together in the TARDIS, at least for now. The Doctor lifted his hands slowly from the controls. There was a smile plastered on his face, but the preciseness of his movements told another story. He was going to lose more friends. Well, not exactly lose, we had survived everything together, but we would be going our separate ways soon enough. He gathered himself quickly, though, the Doctor was never one to waste time while he still had it.

"So, where are we eating?" the Time Lord asked as he shrugged his trench coat back on.

"Well, we've already been to the diner, so I was think we could go to the lunch place. They have soup and sandwiches." I had a colossal love for soup, which made me a huge fan of the lunch place.

"That sounds great!" Sam responded, slipping his hand into mine.

"Let's go then! _Allonsy!_" The Doctor exclaimed. He was smiling again, but this time it was a real smile that made his eyes crinkle.

"And there you go Potato soup and grilled cheese." Our waiter, Dave, finished as set my plate down in front of me.

"Thank you!" I smiled, picking up my spoon. Everyone else was already eating. Dean had a hamburger and Cas, a cheeseburger. Although, he had only gotten it after Dean had insisted that even angels needed to eat. Castiel must not have felt like protesting it, so he had given in and ordered a meal. He tilted his head and lifted the bin curiously, peering at the foreign cheese and beef. Sam had salad, of course, and he was munching away contently on it next to me.

"So what are you and John going to do since we've finished the case here?" I asked Sherlock, pausing at one point to blow on my spoonful of soup.

"We'll be heading to London, and hopefully return to 221 B Bakerstreet." The detective said mater- of-factly as he took another bite of his sandwich. I hadn't heard his order, because Sam had been playfully poking me in the side while Dave was asking us what we wanted. But, whatever the sandwich was it smelled delicious.

"Mmmph," I nearly opened my mouth mid-chew to correct Sherlock, but caught it last minute. Holding up an index finger, I swallowed and continued. "You forgot that you and John are famous around here. There was a whole book series, at least three television series, and several movies based on your lives. 221B Baker Street is a landmark. There's a whole museum and everything there. However, you're show is filmed at… 187 North Gower Street, I think." I looked down at my phone quickly to confirm that fact. "Yeah, so if you get an apartment on that street then it might feel more familiar to you. Speedy's is on that street too. Plus you can always put up a sign that says 221B inside your apartment."

"It will take a little extra adjusting to live around here. We knew that, and we're up for the challenge." John responded, taking a break from eating his chili.

"It'll be weird at first, but I'm sure you guys will start to fit in around here. It isn't that big of a change." I agree, biting into my grilled cheese sandwich.

"What are you planning to do, Lucy?" John asked.

"Well, I need to finish out college. I can graduate this semester, and it ends in December. I'm going to stay here while I finish getting my degree, and then I'll be going on the road with the Winchesters." During all this, Sam had paused in his eating to listen. I hadn't discussed any of this with him beforehand, but ultimately it was my life I was decided on. I had already worked so hard for a college diploma; I wasn't going to drop it within the last stretch. Likewise, I was pretty well adjusted at the school, and I didn't want to leave my classes. I'd have to move in with Mr. Eddie, though. Or live on campus, while my house is under repair.

"That sounds reasonable," Sam agreed, but I could see a slight hurt in his eyes. I remembered that I had said earlier that I would just switch to on-line courses and go traveling with them immediately, but… I needed to call my parents.

I looked down at my half- finished lunch, knowing that until I called my parents the knot in my stomach wouldn't allow me to eat anything else. I sighed and pushed back my chair, "I'll be right back."

I pulled my phone out of my pocket as I exited the building. I wanted privacy for this conversation, and I wouldn't be able to get that if I remained in the restaurant. Dialing the number for my mom's phone, I waited until the second ring when she picked up.

"Hey mom!" I greeted as soon as I could hear movement on the other end of the line.

"Hi Sweetie, how are you doing?" My mother's voice responded, soothing and relaxed.

"I'm fine but…"

"But what?"

Taking a deep breath, I wrapped my jacket around me tighter to shield myself from the brisk air. "I was staying over at a friend's house the other night, and there a pretty bad storm. I didn't think much of it at the time, but I should have. " Last night there actually had been a storm. We had all missed it, because we were in the TARDIS. But, when we all stepped out of the Time Lord's home, we noticed that there were puddles in all the divots in my drive way and branches blown this way and that. "Anyway, it broke all the windows in the front of the house and the window in my bedroom as well. I wasn't in the house when it happened, but when Sam gave me a lift home, we could see the damage pulling into the driveway. There was glass was strewn everywhere mixed with branches and leaves. I don't know how it even happened, but one branch managed to fly through the house and crash through my window. We couldn't step near the foyer at all for fear that the glass would cut us, but from what I could see, no one took advantage of the now weakened security system to rob us."

"Oh, Honey! I'm so sorry you had to deal with that! Have you told anyone else this?" Mom was staying calmer than I imagined she would.

"I wanted to tell you first. And I did so as soon as I could. My friend and I left pretty quickly and now we're all at the sandwich place across the old theater, trying to figure out what to do." Mom could never remember the names of any of the stores in town, so it was better for me to just use the landmarks to describe them.

"Well, I'll call that window installer we used a few years ago to replace the windows in the kitchen." Mom informed me. I stopped my pacing up and down the sidewalk, making a mental note to ask Sherlock to help me set up a crime scene to make it match the story.

"At the moment the house is uninhabitable, so I was wondering," I resumed my pacing again, "if maybe I could rent out one of the apartments near to my college campus?"

"I don't know… it's expensive." I bit back a groan; of course it's too expensive. Just like having a lake house that probably costs 5 times the amount of the crappy apartment I would end up at.

"Would it help my case if I said that I reached a decision on the early graduation thing…" I started wanting her get hopeful before I told her that I'd be graduating early. It was a discussion we'd had many times before. She wanted me graduate early, because it would save them thousands of dollars. I, however, was in favor of staying until graduation in May. Mostly, it was because I couldn't see myself outside of college but, with a quick glance through the window of the diner at all my character idols turned friends, I felt that I could really find a place in this world.

"Perhaps, what did you decide?" She prompted me.

"I'm going to graduate early. I have enough credits, and I think it'd time to move on with my life." I informed her. The decision felt so final as if it, more than the adventures of the past few days , was the turning point in my life.

"So…. If I'm graduating early, we'll have the money to get me an apartment. Plus I'd only be living in it for a few months." If we were making a deal, we were going to do it fairly. I get what I want and she gets what she wants. Dad negotiates through her, but he's usually flexible to whatever's going one. "AND I need somewhere to live while our house is being fixed up." There was a long pause on the other end of the line. I could hear a whispered conversation, but it was too faint for me to get anything out of it. Finally, the sound of fabric scrapping against the receiver alerted me to the fact that my parents had reached a decision.

"As much as we want you to keep living with you, we realize the importance of letting you out into the world before you graduate college. We'll be close by if you need any help, but we agreed that you need to experience living on your own. You should realize that we expect you to pay for most of your housing costs." She started to say something else, but cut herself off. After taking a breath she continued, "You're really growing up, sweetie."

"Aww mom, I'm not that grown up. I mean, I just ordered grilled cheese for lunch, so I still have the heart of a kid."Mom's laugh echoed over the phone sounding like dozens of tiny silver bells. "But, thank you so much! I'll make sure to take good care of my apartment!"

"I'm sure you will," by the soft, proud tone in her voice, I could tell that mom was smiling. "Your dad and I will be driving back up today. Once we've arrived and seen the damage we'll get a person to come over to look at the windows. Then we'll go find you an apartment. Sound like a plan?" If I only had to use one trait to describe my mom, it would have to be efficient. When she saw tasks that needed to be done, she completed them right away. Sometimes it's annoying, but I was feeling very grateful toward that trait at the moment.

"Sounds perfect, Mom! Can you call me when you get here, so I can meet you at the house?"

"Of course, honey. We'll call you when we get there in a few hours."

"Okay Mom!" I paused mentally scanning for anything else I needed to tell her. Oh, boyfriend. Eh, I'd prefer to tell her that in person. There wasn't any other impending information for her to know, so I decided to end the conversation. "Alright then, I think I'm going to go now. I'll see you soon."

"Yes. See you soon, honey," came the response from the other line followed by a click and then silence. I ended the call on my own phone and headed back into the sandwich shop.

Everyone was about finished with their lunch when I returned and in heated conversation.

"What's going on?" I whispered to Sam, not wanting to disrupt the argument.

"Who's the most brilliant," he could barely contain his laughter. Dean, Sherlock, and the Doctor did seem to be the most talkative. Sam, Cas, and John were both relaxed and looked on the verge of laughter, but both of them were trying to keep a straight face. Castiel was definitely keeping his face the most neutral.

"I know that Dean is extremely smart, but I thought Dean thought you were the smart one." I ask, picking up my sandwich again.

"He's going the street smart/ fighting route." Sam responded, flicking his eyes to meet mine. Then they were back watching the three "smarty- pants" verbally duel.

"They're all claiming to different types of brilliance," John explained to me from across the table top. "Dean is claiming brilliance in street smartness, Sherlock his deductive prowess, and the Doctor his knowledge of the universe and humanity itself."

"Everyone is street smart, it's a natural human instinct. It's almost an animalistic trait!" Sherlock exclaimed, breaking my attention away from John.

"Maybe it is cheekbones, but I'd like to see you survive on the streets for years at a time. There's more thought that goes into it than you would think." Dean retorted.

"Pft, please. I could survive on the streets any day."

"What if you needed money and your _mummy_ wasn't there to provide it?!"

"I'd pickpocket individuals that I deemed unworthy of the amount of money they had. Politicians, fat old men, et cetra, et cetra."

"Like you could actually pickpocket anyone!" Dean said, shaking his head a little as if he were talking to an unruly fifth grader.

Sherlock smirked, his eyes dancing. Silently he held up Dean's wallet, while John, Sam and I burst into stomach- hurting laughter. Castiel was grinning and watching Dean slid his hands into each and every pocket he was currently wearing, eight, as he realized that he didn't have his wallet on him.

"Son of bitch." He muttered. Looking back at Sherlock, Dean demanded, "Give me my wallet back."

"Oh but shouldn't your so-called street smartness easily overcome my measly deductions to gain possession of your wallet again."

"If we weren't in restaurant, cheekbones, I'd be all up in you-"

"Oooookay," John interjected cutting Dean off. He threw the wallet across the table to the hunter. "There you go."

Sherlock narrowed his brows, checking his right pocket. He glanced over at John, gracing with a genuine smile. "I'm starting to rub off on you, aren't I?"

"Not at all. I learned to pickpocket while in the army. We had to do _something_ for fun. We played a game where we'd steal from the most annoying soldier that day. It was all in good fun, and I was considered the best for whatever reason." John replied keeping his face straight, but his eyes were laughing, obviously overjoyed to have caught Sherlock off guard.

"Well if you two lovebirds would mind coming back to the rest of the world," the Doctor was into the argument enough that his Scottish accent was starting to show, and it was a truly beautiful sound to hear. "I doubt you'd be able to make if on your own for very long Sherlock, sure you could lower your classy self down to the level of the homeless, but without John you'd be a mess."

"I would be motivated to get home." Sherlock retorted immediately. John blushed slightly.

"That's the point, though. You would be distracted, and distractions never help in a fight." Dean interjected, taking the Doctor's point and running with it.

"For your puny minds probably, but mine works differently than yours." Sherlock snapped at Dean. He turned to the Doctor, "as for you what good will knowing who the prime minister is, or whatever 'knowledge of the universe is' actually help you. That's knowledge not brilliance."

"Oi! It's brilliance when I use it! Have you ever faced an army of daleks without a plan and still won against them?!"

"Oh yeah, brains in metal suits that have a toilet plunger as an arm, I'm sure they're really hard to defeat," Dean scoffed.

"Well at least they have brains, what do ghosts have? They're made out of nothing at all except residual energy."

"I'd like to see you take on a ghost, if it's so easy then!"

"I'd like to see you take on a dalek!"

"You two wouldn't stand a chance against Moriarty!"

By this point, the rest of us were all in stitches laughing over their argument. It was obvious to see that they were all brilliant and had knowledge in completely different fields. At this point, though, Dave the waiter came back to collect our plates. After seeing the slightly perturbed stare Dave was aiming at the three debaters, John cut in ending the argument with the point that they are were very smart in their respective fields. Castiel leaned his head close to Dean and whispered something, probably a statement to reaffirm Dean's intelligence, making him blush.

"How did the conversation with your mom go?" Sam asked, turning as much as he could in the wooden chairs to face me. I had mentioned in passing on the way over here that I was going to have to call her. He must have put together from seeing me paced outside the front window of the sandwich shop that I had been talking to my mom.

"It went as well as I could hope for. I'm going apartment hunting this week once they get back, I'll be finishing college a year early, and then I get to go on the road with you and Dean." I replied. Of course, that wasn't the full extent of my plan; I was hoping to be working on and finishing up a novel during the next year or so. I'd have lots of time in the near future to share more of my dreams with Sam.

"Right, Lucy, I was thinking about that." Sam's tone had switched from joyful to profession, definitely not a good sign. "Once you get dragged into this, there is no getting out. You can' just turn around and head home when you get tired, because the monsters and the knowledge of what you've done to them are inescapable. It's a occupational hazard, and one that I don't want you to have to face. I really think that you should reconsider joining Dean and I." An avalanche of rocks placed itself in my stomach as Sam finished speaking. Did he not want me around? Did he think I couldn't handle it? No… he was probably just worried for my safety? That seemed like a very Sam-like thing to do.

"I appreciate the sentiment, I really do, but I've already been dragged into this mess. The moment I found Ally's body, I entered this world. You can say you dragged me into this all you want, but know that I was willing to be dragged in. It's my greatest dream Sam, to have an adventure and to do something with my life. I wouldn't trade it for the world, so like it or not I will be traveling with you, Dean, and Cas." I looked Sam straight in the eye daring him to challenge me.

"I uhh-" he took another moment to compose his thoughts. "If you still feel like that when you graduate then you can come a long. Heck, you'll probably force your way into our lives. I guess… you may have already done that, though." He slipped his hand into mine.

Raising his glass of water, Sam looked at me. I picked up my own glass a bit awkwardly with my left hand, not wanting to unwind my fingers from Sam's. The young hunter smiled widely enough that the corners of his eyes crinkled. "Here's to new adventures and colliding fates."

"Cheers." I responded clicking my class against his and taking a sip. All the possibilities that lay out in the future were both daunting and excited and my mind spasms in excitement every time I thought of everything to come.

I planted a gentle kiss on Sam's shoulder, as it was the only part of him that I could reach, and began to imagine my life surrounded by the characters I was always told were fake and ready to focus on what I wanted my life to become.

**The End.**


End file.
